Mini 739 ~ Mafia Jailbreak, Game Over

[Rhinox]

/confirm

vote spyrex

since he is one of the 2 people I recommended for this game.

FOS rhinox

for being the other.

hmmm... conspiracy...

vote: bio

because I'm the one who recommended HIM for this game! Also, OMGUS! an FOS on ME!?!

P.S.

3) Voting: Votes should be in bold in order for them to count, for instance:

Vote: Prof. Guppy

.

This made me laugh

Yeah I almost rolled off my chair too. Easily my favorite rule.

P.S.S. This game has an all-star line-up as far as I'm concerned... I've been so looking forward to this game.

P.S.S.S.

Vote: Rhinox

Still smarting from that newbie game where you spanked me.

Yeah, I've been doing that lately, on both sides *cough* Mafia 87 *cough*

P.S.S.S.S. Huntress, I usually have strong things to say against those who don't random vote in the RVS, which usually ends up being a big argument, and a waste of time. That being said, I'd still prefer to see you random voting...

P.S.S.S.S.S. Sorry bout taking so long to post... I'm most active Monday through Friday, and last night was the superbowl, and I was busy this weekend kicking ass in mafia 87 (yes, I'm damn proud of myself for that).

P.S.S.S.S.S.S I hope my fellow town members read the rules, specifically the part about what is and isn't allowed in a bah post, and the consequences for not following said rule. If not, go read the rules now.

[Rhinox]

P.S.S.S.S. Huntress, I usually have strong things to say against those who don't random vote in the RVS, which usually ends up being a big argument, and a waste of time. That being said, I'd still prefer to see you random voting...

So why not say them? Don't you agree that serious discussion has to root either in jokes or in theory discussion?

hmmm... those are 2 options for sparking serious discussion. Another option is random votes, which huntress has not done. However, based on my completed games, I can't find a correlation between players who don't RV and the probability they are scum. I still believe not RV is anti-town, but null in terms of finding scum. And I just don't feel like hopping up on my soapbox about it this time.

[Rhinox]

Yet my non-vote has caused more discussion so far than any vote.

I agree... but, there can be good discussion and bad discussion. Would it be good discussion if I thought you were scum for refusing to RV, if you were actually town? Would that make me scum if I thought refusing to RV was a scum tell?

Also, what are you learning from this conversation?

And a question: Why are you not mentioning My Milked Eek, who also posted without voting?

Well, I never said everyone has to RV in their very first post, I just think its better if everyone does it. MME only confirmed, so who knows what he's planning on doing once he starts talking about the game. You actually said you weren't random voting, so thats the difference.

Look! votes can spark conversation too!

I seem to be popular in the early stages of the game.

Do you have a problem being popular?

[Rhinox]

Now a question for you since the setup presents an opportunity for a SK to exist. I know your first game on the site you were SK. I also noticed in your post game comments from mafia 87 that you suspected Tar of being SK when you replaced in. Since he did turn out to be SK, maybe you learned something from your SK experience on how to hunt for them.

What lead you to correctly believe Tar was SK in mafia 87?

Wow. Now thats a question. First things first... my first game on the site was a newbie, my second game on the site was a mini theme in which I was town. My 3rd game on the site I was an SK...

Regarding Mafia 87, and thinking Tar was an SK initially when I replaced in, it was basically a conspiracy theory that just happened to be correct this time. It required too many assumptions to be true, plus a little bit of luck on Tar's part that he was able to fake claim how he did. It seemed more likely he was actually what he said he was. I try to keep my conspiracies repressed because 99% of the time they'll be wrong.

As far as anything else regarding how I specifically try to recognize sk's, I'd rather not say so I don't tell any sk in this game exactly how not to act. Until I have any reason to believe otherwise, I will be hunting dirty cops.

[Rhinox]

Ahhh, ok. I don't know why I thought our first game together was your first game on the site.

probably because I played like crap for an sk

Reading your post after Mafia 87 closer, this seems consistent with what you said there. I guess since you were replacing in late (D4) it had already been established there was a SK and the number of possible suspects was limited.

Actually, it was established that there was an sk

or a vig

. I was a vig, and knowning who my predecessor targetted, there were no other unexplained kills aside from the one Tar claimed was his 1-shot.

Random votes are often wrong too (and generally don't end in the lynch of the person who is initially wagoned), but you are a fan of those. I assume this is for the discussion they generate (correct me if wrong). Theories - even if wrong - will also generate discussion and the discussion IMO will have more merit than early game RV discussion. Why do you choose to keep your theories repressed?

Well, you're kinda mixing a couple of my philosophies together. RVS/discussion and conspiracy theories about who is scum near endgame are 2 completely different situations that I handle differently. I like random votes at the beginning of a game because random votes don't lynch anyone, but they still generate discussion. Theories/Mafia theory at the beginning of the game is a fine strategy as well. I believe everyone should random vote because if nobody ever voted (usually the people not voting in the random voting stage use the excuse "why should I vote until I have an idea of who's scum), there would never be any opportunities for scum to do something scummy, so there would never be a reason to vote. You're actually proving a point that you can generate conversation without a vote, that may or may not lead to somebody casting a vote one someone for a non-random reason. I have a point because 3 random votes on you got you to respond and comment on it. Votes and theory discussion both work at the start of a game. I prefer everyone random votes, and I accept theory discussion as well.

Conspiracy theories about who is scum is a completely different can of worms. I consider conspiracy theories to be something that is theoretically possible, but requires a number of assumptions to be true, and can't be proven. For example, in Mafia 87, there were no unexplained kills, other than Tar's claimed 1-shot. I couldn't prove Tar was sk without using 3 or 4 assumptions, but to believe his claim required no assumptions because there weren't any question marks unanswered. I hold my conspiracies like those back because they're probably wrong, and if they're true, there will probably be some evidence pop up before it becomes too late... especially if the scum doesn't know I'm onto them. If they're wrong, it could distract the town, and incriminate myself for seeming to manufacture a stretchy case (bad if I'm town). Downside is, there might be a time when I know I'm right, but don't speak up before its too late...

And now I think I've talked enough about mafia 87... I'm excited I played well and helped the town win after replacing in, but its time to focus on this game don't you think?

Time for some questions for you:

Just because an SK is possible, doesn't mean there is one... What do we stand to gain from talking about an SK now when we don't know one exists? What are you trying to acomplish by analyzing my sk catching ability? What are you trying to learn by talking about how I felt in mafia 87?

Huntress: Why don't you want to random vote?

[Rhinox]

Selective scumhunting, that's a buzzword..

agreed. If you meta some of my games, you'll find a nice list of other similar buzzwords I dislike. Actually, I'm not sure I've come across selective scum hunting before, so I'll add it to my list.

That being said, korts explained why he felt bio might be selective scumhunting, so I don't see it as anything more than to make a mental note of right now. What I dislike most is players who attack with one of these buzzwords without being able to explain why.

Bio: I agree with #37. I don't view any conversation as useless, so long as its mafia related.

Pops: I don't know what to think of your use of WIFOM to give bio scum points for it because "It sounds like something you would do as scum"... but at the same time downplaying it calling it "bad for the brain"

Korts: I use to like the Tarhalindur Standard Tells, but after playing with Tar a couple times (both times Tar was scum), I'm starting to get the feeling that the true purpose of that page is for Tar's meta so he can have ammunition to forge mislynches as scum... Sometimes they're valid, but they're too vague to be reliable.

[Rhinox]

He did post. Are you suggesting he posted without reading the dozen posts already in the thread? What makes you think he doesn't know the game had started?

There are a number of reasons to explain MME... the role PM's say to confirm in thread, thats what his did. Maybe he didn't have time right then to do more, but didn't want to get replaced for not confirming. If MME never posts again, and needs to be replaced, then that means he just flaked and his confirm post doesn't really mean anything. If MME returns, then I would like to ask him why he only confirmed in his first post, then disappeared for X pages/days.

Any discussion at this stage is grist to the mill. Whether it's good or bad can be information in itself.

This is true.

That's drawing conclusions, not discussing.

You sort of avoided the question... obviously, there would be discussion to follow if I came to a conclusion that you were scum for not random voting. I'll rephrase my question: Would discussion about you being scum for not random voting be helpful to the town, assuming you're town? Would you be able to draw any conclusion about your attacker, assuming he felt that not random voting was a scumtell?

No, I said I wasn't voting yet. MME didn't say that, but the result was the same, no vote.

So... suppose I laid out a good case to lynch Player Y and voted. Player X comes along immediately after me and votes Player Y "for what Rhinox said". Player Y is then lynched. Are you saying that my vote and Player X's vote mean exactly the same thing and should be understood and analyzed exactly the same way, since the same result was reached (both players voting for a player that was lynched)?

Furthermore, there is an assumption to make if MME's post is the same as yours since the result is the same - that assumption is that MME was intending to not random vote, so solely confirmed. Your post requires no assumptions - you said you were not random voting. MME's intentions are not known. Yours are. You intended not to random vote. That is why I'm questioning your decision to not random vote, and not MME.

What makes you think I don't want to random vote?

You said you weren't random voting, and you haven't voted yet... Generally, if you wanted to do something, you would do it unless something was physically preventing you, or unless you thought you shouldn't. So the only conclusions I can draw right now are A)You don't want to random vote, or B)You want to but you don't think you should.

[Rhinox]

oooppss... missed all of page 3 before posting...

Uh, why did I agree to join a game with Rhinox? The best part about modding Rhinox is that you don't actually have to read his posts.

Hehe that is true... I've been working really hard to be more concise in my posting though, so I think I've gotten a lot better since Meerkat Manor Mafia.

I only bring this up because I think, despite this being true,

it's very probable that there will be one.

I think so mainly because as I go through the roles it just seems like it would fit into the scenario pretty well.

It's very likely that

we should be able to tell by tomorrow if there is an SK or not regardless though.

There are no town killing roles on the list, so if two people leave us tomorrow night, then an SK would be the only answer to that problem.

A question for you Rhinox, since we're getting into the theoretical discussion anyways,

what do you think of people who vote themselves during the RV stage?

Regarding an sk, I wouldn't go so far to say its probable there will be one... thats kinda outguessing the mod, which is pretty much impossible since this is Vi's first modded game here (pretty sure). My point was, we should know tomorrow or at some point down the road if there is an sk to deal with, so why worry about it before we know? All this talking about an SK right now is only affecting the way the SK would play (if one exists) - giving the SK information on how to better play, and hurting the town (because the SK already has more information to play with than the town).

Regarding self voting, I hate that even more than not voting. Town has no business self voting because the only discussion that follows is whether or not that player is scum for self voting. Its a distraction to actually finding scum if you're town, and its a confusion tactic if you're scum - both anti-town. You can't catch scum jumping on your own wagon when you actually do something scummy intentionally - you never know if everyone really thinks it is a scumtell or not. Also, when you vote for someone, you should do it because you think there is a chance that person is scum - even a rondom vote. A player voting themselves, then, must think there is a chance that they are scum. A player would know if they are scum or not, so... yeah, self voting pretty much gets an automatic vote from me.

I mean, I want to keep bringing this point up because I think the town should assume there is an SK until proven otherwise, not the other way around.

No. Town should hunt scum only, until it is proven there is an SK. In one of my games (I think it was Meerkat Manor Mafia, actually), a scum player (CKD) pushed for the lynch of a town player (StrangerCoug) on the grounds that he was playing like an sk (the day before LyLo), even though there was no unexplained kill in the game. We lynched SC only because at that point, either SC or CKD were the final scum in the game. CKD self hammered the next day after SC was lynched town, and the town still won.

But my point is... unless there are sk kills, there is no reason to suspect an sk, nor hunt for one. If there are extra kills tomorrow, we'll know. If an sk doesn't kill to hide his identity, then ultimately that is better for the town since the game would be balanced for 2 evil kills per night (at least at the start), and by not killing the SK is guarenteeing that extra town roles will live longer.

Going to post something tonight.

Looking forward to it.

[Rhinox]

I don't like how multiple people jumped to the defense of MME. First pops, now Rhinox; I smell connections.

Its a stretch to calling what I was doing as defending MME... I was directly responding to Huntress' question as to why I did not question MME for not random voting as well as her. The post you quoted was my reason why, taken out of context.

Here's a question, Rhinox: if someone posts, and keeps posting, without (randomly) voting yet also without explicitly stating the decision not to vote, would you start questioning them?

Yes, I would.

viewtopic.php?t=9032 - self voter AND a no-voter... after FoSing them both and questioning, I voted the self voter as a felt that was a bigger offense. After a long fight, the self voter agreed with me and would think more carefully before self voting in the future. Both myself, and the self voter were town, as was the player who didn't vote in the RVS. Another player, who said "vote mafiamann , because not voting in the rv stage can be a scumtell. Therefore this is no random vote." ended up being scum. *shrug* But it was not the intent of mafiamann to not vote to find scum, he was just a VI who got himself lynched D1 anyways. Town won this game. Rishi was the mod.

I completely disagree. vollkan makes it a point to self-vote frequently early on in games purely because it draws the opportunistic "OMGOSH SELFVOTER=SCUM" comments which are completely wrong. It also draws theory discussion on whether self-voting is good or bad or null; I think it's an entirely valid way to start off discussion if not done simply as a gimmick and without theoretical basis (i.e. Natirasha, UltimaAvalon).

SELFVOTER=NOT PRO-TOWN. regardless of the theory behind it, I'm always going to vote a self voter, and that does not make me opportunistic scum. There is a clear divide within the community about self-voting, and discussion about it and doing it only widens the gap, and distracts from the true purpose of the game. I'm on the "Town should never self-vote" side, and I play accordingly. Weren't you the one who said...

Rhinox, I disagree with you on the issue of random votes. They should be taken just as seriously as normal votes, otherwise any pressure they represent is non-existent, which is counter-intuitive. The power in random votes is exactly the fact that they are in essence the same as any well-reasoned vote, the sans reason part aside. Random votes can lynch, as they should.

...about random votes? actually, all votes should be seen as a serious vote to lynch someone. A self-voter, then, is wanting to lynch themselves. Intentionally mislynching a known townie = scummy, which is why no town player should ever self vote, and is why every player who self votes will also earn my vote.

[Rhinox]

I think you are falling into a logical trap here.

1. In order for the action of a self-vote to be anti-town, the player needs to be town.
2. If you vote the player and state the action is anti-town, you are then voting someone you believe to be town and yourself acting in an anti-town manner.
3. If the player is mafia and voting for them self, they are acting pro-town and anti-mafia.

I think that logic is false. Mafia's goal is to gain a majority of the town, but the mafia's goal is not "lynch the town players". Mafia do all sorts of things with their votes, such as intentionally bussing - and bussing is not typically considered anti-mafia, yet according your logic it should be. Mafia also get other ways to eliminate town (i.e. nks). My logic is also not circular, as you suggest. I do not say a townie self-voting is anti town, so self-voting is anti town (that would be a logic fault as you point out) - I say a townie self voting is anti town, so a townie acting towards fulfilling their win condition

would

should never self vote. Therefore, any players who self votes

is

would be scum

if townie players would stop self-voting

.

You are also making a jump to say any vote is an intent to lynch. As you saw in our newbie game, I will use my vote in quite a few ways and not always have an end goal of lynching. Did your random vote have the intent of lynching? I know mine did not.

That statement was in response to Kort, who said every vote, even a random one, should be seen as a serious vote with a threat of following through to a lynch. If that is true, it should extend to self-voters - that a self vote is a serious vote with a threat of following through to a lynch. You may place a vote for a number of reasons, but there must be the threat of it going to a lynch, or else the vote is pointless. Players who vote by saying "vote: player Y just for pressure" should also be

lynched

slapped with a raw fish.

[Rhinox]

Ohh goodness another game starts with a self-vote spurring madness.

Actually nobody self-voted and I probably should not have made my last post debating the theory of self-voting.

Well, you and Korts are the ones who wanted to talk about theory...

[Rhinox]

It is slightly odd you don't see SK as 'scum' and you see hunting one type of player against the town's win condition as more valuable than the other. It also indicates you would be able to identify the difference during the game.

Both SK and mafia are working against the town win condition. If a SK was called 'solo mafia', would that change anything?

oooh...sorry, my bad: "No. Town should hunt

scum

the primary mafia faction

only, until it is proven there is an SK

or second mafia faction

. fixed. I meant to type mafia. of course sk are scum.

However, to answer the first part of your question, I don't see hunting for an sk as beneficial to the town until it is known there is an sk. We KNOW there is mafia. It would make no difference if the SK was called solo mafia - I wouldn't hunt for a second mafia family in a game were 2 mafia families were possible, if there were no kills that pointed to their presence.

I don't like eliminating opportunities for scum to make slip up.

Well, it is my belief that talking about an sk will do nothing but remind the sk (if in the game) that we're aware that an sk is possible and we're looking for sk tells/slips... This would cause an sk to play more cautiously, and possibly alter the way an sk would play in a way that would make an sk harder to find. Just as you say the selective scumhunting attack is no longer valid for the rest of the game, anything that would be discussed about sk tells, or how to find an sk, would make that tell invalid as well. That is why I was originally suspicious when you asked me how I would recognize an sk. It seems like it would be eliminating opportunities for an sk to slip up.

--------------

Oh god, my life. I should have realized what I was getting into signing up for another game with Rhinox and Jahudo.

I promise I won't fake tunnelvision on you this time... unless I think you're scum

[Rhinox]

I guess the biggest issue I am having is that everybody is making hunting for these different types of scum as mutually exclusive. How would you know if a player you thought was scum was primary or secondary mafia?

I wouldn't, but it wouldn't matter... wait, are we arguing the same thing again?

Right now, if I think a player is scummy, it doesn't matter if they're scum-1, scum-2, or sk. Once we know (if) there are multiple evil factions, then it could be possible to hunt for the different scum differently based on different connections... For example, I think an sk would like to set up a last day situation where the town is convinced they need to find a mafian and are looking for a mafia connection instead of trying to find an sk. Thats why its ok to hunt for different killing elements, but only after we know they exist. However...

On the flip of all that, if we do determine there is a SK, I think these first 3 pages of players expressing opinions on if we should / should not hunt for a SK (even though that was not the original topic) will prove to have a good chunk of information. If we had waited until we knew one existed, it may have been too late for town.

I see your point here, and its not invalid... however, my pessimistic mind instead thinks that the last 3 pages is instead chock full of info for a potential sk to alter their playstyle in a way that makes it more difficult for the town, plus possibly be able to use that info to frame someone.

I can see your point here. I didn't expect you to make a point by point outline on SK play though. I do know from your play in the ongoing game that you aren't just going to outline your full thoughts and you are cautious of what information you reveal.

So, you're saying that I'm consistent between the two games, at least in that one regard... what do you think that means?

Anti-town doesn't equal scummy. Why do you think scum would have more motivation to self-vote? What would they achieve by that? If you agree there's no motivation either way, why do you insist on voting for it, since it's a nulltell?

I've never actually lynched someone for self-voting in the random stage, but if my auto-voting everybody who self votes gets them to not do it again, then thats reason enough for me to keep doing it I agree, its basically just a null tell that should be ignored, but most players don't ignore it, which encourages players to continue this (IMO) bad strategy. So I argue against it to subvert it.

This I agree with. But do you really think an anti-town action should be punished with a lynch if it is clear that it is not scummy (as in scum have no more motivation to do it than town)?

No, which is why I crossed out the lynched part and tried to make a joke. But most if not all lynch wagons do start with a single anti-town comment...

[Rhinox]

What walks on four legs at first, then at two, and then finally on three?

hehe... I know the answer

[Rhinox]

@RC...

I (and everyone else) are well aware that an sk is possible in the game. I am not arguing we should discount the possibility of an sk, I am arguing that continually insisting there is more probably an sk is doing nothing to help us find scum today... but I'll let you prove me wrong: How is assuming the worst case scenario that there is an sk going to help us catch scum today? How is talking about the presence of an sk today going to help us catch scum any other day?

Regarding Korts vs. Pops, I don't find pops' jokes, or the talk about nothing comment to be scummy, but I'm still uneasy about the WIFOM analysis of bio post: especially the part where he said he was leaning more towards bios comments being indicative of mafia because "it sounded like something he would do as mafia"

Pops: Anything you can divine from from the rest of the conversation about sks?what do you think of RC's comments about SK? What do you think about mine? What about OGML's?

[Rhinox]

RC is saying that we should assume the worst until better is proven. Ok, sure. The way he discusses it though is not as curt it should be though, which gives me a slight scum vibe. I've decided to read this player mostly on meta, because when i read him just like everyone else he consistently slips by, so i might be using poorly explained reasons some this game, i'll try to be glass man like Korts as much as possible though.

My question still stands, but I'll rephrase it: how does assuming the worst until proven better help us catch scum today, or any other day? I'll also add on: hypothetically, its day 5. 3 mafia goons have already been killed, but the game continues. There has been 1 kill every night. How do we hunt for the final scum? Do we still assume there is an sk since we haven't been proven otherwise (sk could have targetted the same player as scum every night) and hunt accordingly, or do we assume that 1 kill per night means that only mafia is left and look for mafia connections? Or do we just vote for whoever we think is the scummiest, without worrying about what faction they're a part of? Also, your jumping to the defense of RC without letting him answer questions directed at him himself, is noted.

I've decided to read this player mostly on meta, because when i read him just like everyone else he consistently slips by,

so i might be using poorly explained reasons some this game

, i'll try to be glass man like Korts as much as possible though.

I don't like this post at all... why are you coming up with excuses for future use of poorly explained reasoning?

I'll have him know that Natirasha totally won a game with his self-vote once though. It's a legit strat.

Was he scum? if so, that only supports my policy of voting self-voters in the RVS. If he was town, please link me the game so I can see how a self-vote in the RVS was directly responsible for a town win...

also,

unvote: bio

because I don't find him scummy.

vote: pops

. currently most scummy IMO.

[Rhinox]

Rhinox – You’re currently not suspicious of bionicchop, even after this last post? Interesting.

Actually, I typed up my post without considering 83 (it was sort of a cross post - it takes me a while to type posts since I'm at work and I only type a sentence at a time in between doing my job )

After I previewed, I noticed bio's post, read it, and decided it didn't change my view on bio.

Also, I said I didn't find bio scummy - not that I didn't find him suspicious. I still don't like the sk talk, and I'm not sure I agree with all of his reasonings for voting you, but I don't see anything scummy about it, or inconsistent with the play and opinions bio has already established. Also, any suspicions I have of bio (or RC) for continuing the sk theory discussion are currently being overshadowed by pops 82, and his riddles.

[Rhinox]

Did they become suspicious when you decided you could make up a full case?

crap. I've been doing this a lot recently... saying what I don't mean...

My vote on you was mostly because of post 82, and the riddles are just starting to piss me off only because I didn't get the last one. In all seriousness, the last one "to spite Rishi" is kind of just uncalled for and pointless, since you already explained why you were giving us riddles (to mock korts, basically). Continuing to do so no longer serves a purpose.

[Rhinox]

Policy vote? I don't think I would call it that...

RC is saying that we should assume the worst until better is proven. Ok, sure. The way he discusses it though is not as curt it should be though, which gives me a slight scum vibe.

Here pops jumps to RC's defense after I asked RC questions, whithout giving RC a chance to answer the questions himself. In the same paragraph, however, its giving him a slight scum vibe. This sounds like fence-sitting, and a bad attempt at distancing.

I've decided to read this player mostly on meta, because when i read him just like everyone else he consistently slips by, so i might be using poorly explained reasons some this game, i'll try to be glass man like Korts as much as possible though.

I've already explained what I don't like about this part of the post.

Thats pretty much it. Its not much, but its more to go on IMO than the other discussions right now (sks, not voting, and self voting). Afterall, as my wise IC guide once told me way back in my first game:

Early in the game, the threshold for earning my vote is necessarily lower than later on when we've got more to go on.

I probably shouldn't have added in the riddles part, but its interesting to watch my argument get strawmaned for it.

What about my vote makes you call it a "policy vote"?

Also, do you agree with pops and korts about their views on self-voting?

[Rhinox]

Is that how you read the statement, or are you getting something else out of it?

Actually, I think I need a word-a-day calander, because thats not how I interpretted "curt".

I interpretted the statement: "RC is saying that we should assume the worst until better is proven. Ok, sure. The way he discusses it though is not as curt it should be though, which gives me a slight scum vibe."

as: "RC is saying that we should assume the worst until better is proven. What's wrong with that? Although, he's discussing it in a way that sounds scummy"

Regardless, I don't think it changes anything, unless pops can tell me that the paragraph in question had any point other than to defend/answer for RC, while calling him scummy, but preparing us for future "my meta on RC makes me think he is scum/town" comments that are poorly reasoned.

Also, EBWOP: Add in my general dislike of pops WIFOM post analyzing bio into 93... I forgot to mention it in that post, and that also falls under the "Why I'm currently voting Pops" category.

Also, premptive EBWOP for crossposts:

Rhinox, you're completely ignoring Korts. Why?

Well, maybe I haven't been giving korts as much attention as others, but I wouldn't say I'm ignoring him - at least not intentionally. There are other players I haven't directly commented on as well, so unless there is some reason I should specifically be paying attention to korts, I don't see the problem...

unless korts asked me a question I've missed, in which case my previous paragraph will look kinda silly then.

That must have been Prof. Guppy, because I can't think of any other ICs in that game who could be considered wise

now now... we both know Prof. Guppy can and has been called a lot of things... Wise was never one of them

[Rhinox]

ok, Korts 57 had some questions for me.. I answered them in 60. Thats the last korts and I have directly conversed.

Other players (IAUN, for example) I haven't mentioned once (until now).

What makes you think I'm ignoring Korts, and what makes you think that is any more notable than the other players I haven't been talking about yet?

[Rhinox]

Yes it would be helpful as it would tell us something about the person doing the attacking, and the reactions of those who joined in, or who didn't join in, could also be useful. Although I might have to do a meta read as well before drawing any conclusions.

Partially agree. Agree with learning things about 3rd party participants. Disagree with learning things about the attacker.

Yes, I think they should both be looked at in the same way, i.e. in context, but the conclusions drawn from them might well be different.

That sounds like a cop-out to me. I gave you the context in my hypothetical example.

Does this still apply even though we are out of the RVS?

In a situation where the RVS is over, and I do a re-read and discover a player who was posting during the RVS but never random voted, I would start questioning that player, probably starting with a "Player X, is there a reason why you never random voted anyone?" question.

But regardless, you're non-random vote is no longer interesting to, compared to the rest of the ongoings in the thread.

You asked me what i thought about RC's comments about SK. I summarized his position, said how i felt about his position, and then mentioned that i thought his answers were slightly scummy. How do you get answered for or defended out of that? I didn't even know, nor do i know now, of any questions you asked RC or any pressure you had on him.

I still regret my declaration about poorly explained reasoning. I should have handled that on a case by case basis and not worried about it. If it's still scummy to you, okay, let it stand.

Rhinox - I missed the part where you directly asked pops about RC. How do you justify jumping on him for 'defending' RC when he was answering your question?

...

I'm really playing like a (Village) Idiot this game...

lame, but true excuse: all 4 of my games I'm in got extremely active at the same time, the last couple days, and because of that I've been playing extremely crappy - i.e. not typing things the way I intend them to me, and now blatently forgetting which questions I've asked to which players.

Also, without getting too sentimental, I've been looking forward to this game ever since Vi PMed me the list of pre-ins. This game is pretty much full of great players, and I was looking forward to the opportunity to prove I could run with some of the best mafiascum.net has to offer. The end result is me being a bit off my game, trying too hard, being a bit flustered, and looking like a big idiot.

unvote

with a promise to take a little bit of time to re-read and pull my head out of my ass.

Question for pops though (I'll remember asking this one): If roles were reversed, and someone used that attack on me that I used on you, I would have reacted a little differently, more like "WTF! you just asked me for my opinion on it... what the hell are you talking about?" You seemed like you were willing to give me a pass:

If it's still scummy to you, okay, let it stand.

Why were you so unphased by my obviously contradictory attack and so willing to just let me leave my vote there? ...just seems odd to me...

@RC: you never answered my question, but I'm willing to take the blame for not asking curtly enough (Rhinox likes his new word )

How will this talk about the SK help us catch scum - any scum - today?

I'm not trying to force a distinction between different scumhunting for different types of scum (at least not on D1 when factions are 100% unknown), I just want to know how this sk conversation is going to help you decide who is most likely scum today.

When I look at the list of role possibilities, ironically, it tells me what is possible - NOT what is probable. I'm not a mod, and maybe I don't have a full understanding of how to properly balance a game, and considering this is Vi's first modded game, I don't presume to try to predict what type of mod Vi is, or what roles Vi likes to use and considers balanced. For all I know, this game could be 100% Vanilla... or maybe it contains every single role on the list. You or I don't know, and I want to know how speculating or assuming what is in the setup is going to help you catch the scum today.

I don't want to push this situation much further, but suffice to say I think some people (certainly I) would treat the game differently if there are 2 killing parties as opposed to 1.

So you're assuming 2 killing parties right now... how are you playing D1 any differently than if there was only 1 killing faction?

Are you honestly going to sit here and tell me that you play the game the same way whether there is one or two killing parties?

Question asked toward Rishi, but I would like to answer for myself. I don't play any differently until I know for sure there are multiple killing factions. For example, suppose there are 2 kills tonight. I would deduce that the second kill must have been made my an sk. Then I would be able to look at everyone and try to determine who seems to be playing like an sk. You can't do that on Day 1, so saying we should assume there are two killing factions right now on D1 and play accordingly is silly. To prove my point, suppose I said "MME is playing like I would as SK. He's acting lurky, not providing much content, and trying to both avoid the focus of the town, and not look pro-town so as to not be a nk target. We should lynch MME because I think he's an sk." Would it make any sense to lynch anyone today on the grounds they might be the sk? And to re-ask the question that I think Rishi was trying to ask, how should we play differently today by assuming there is an SK, as opposed to assuming there is not an SK, as opposed to not assuming any factions at all?

If you were uneasy about pops' argument, why don't I remember you having the same feeling about my selective scumhunting comment? It boils down to the same thing. You said that selective scumhunting was a buzzword, like pops said, but that I explained it adequately; yet now you say that pops thoroughly explaining this buzzword makes you uneasy?

Thats an inaccurate representation of my feelings. I didn't think pops was explaining the buzzword, I thought (think) pops was trying to be WIFOMy and divine whether bio's discussion made him more likely scum, town, or sk.

[Rhinox]

So, to show you can run with the best, you start massive usage of appeal to emotion? This is so full of ironic phail it makes me laugh.

Yes, I realize both the irony and the phail. But, its the truth. More ironic phail: This is wifom, but what would be the benefit of saying "oops I'm just a VI who made a scummy mistake?" if I were actually scum. Why wouldn't I just make up some BS about how even though you were answering my question I still found it overly defending RC and scummy (kinda like I did when I forgot I said I didn't find your jokes scummy, and then said I did find them scummy later *facepalm*...)

Oh wait, did I say that out loud?

pssst....

Mod: you forgot to list Prison Guard Jester in your list of potential roles!

Seriously though, I realize the idiotic irony of both my attacks, and my current defense of them. Nothing to do about it now except promise to do better, if you guys don't lynch me... I don't like to just sit around letting other people do all the scum hunting work just sitting in the shadows waiting for a wagon to jump on. I like to throw my vote around a bit in addition to using questions and logic in order to assist myself in determining who should be the best lynch - especially early in the game when there is less to go on than later. Sometimes I place votes just for pressure and reactions based on something I normally wouldn't find lynchable, but that effect is kind of lost when I can't keep straight what I already said I didn't find scummy I'm just off my game here...

I feel quite quoted out of context. The component of the attack that was about me defending RC, that's complete bantha pudu and that doesn't stand. The component about me announcing that i would use RC's meta later on: i agree i probably didn't need to announce that. It's retracted to the highest degree possible on a forum without editing.

Oh, ok... My bad.

Pretty unforgivable stuff i've been putting out here, eh?

Trying to determine bio's allignment = perfectly fine.

Doing so using nothing but wifom = questionable to me.

I noticed everyone got the most pissed about riddles after that last one. It's okay if you guys don't want to simply admit you don't know the answer .

I already admitted I didn't know it

[Rhinox]

For me, mafia is becoming less about direct question / answer (unless you have scum pinned on a specific topic) and more about what happens in the peripheral of the discussion. So, I ask you about SK stuff and we talk a little. Now at this point, I don't really know what others are going to say, but they are going to say something. As you can see, it has evolved into we shouldn't be discussing it / it is a valid discussion.

Hidden in there might be the type of scum who likes to attack people for bringing up something that may appear to not be scum hunting or they feel they can spin it into something else. There may also be the type of scum that just go with the flow and agree to whatever more people are agreeing with. The reality is it might gain nothing at this specific time (hell, it might gain nothing ever).

Now it ties in a little to some things you have hinted at (nothing specific I can remember),

but if someone knows you are hunting for them, they will hide better. So, mafia thinks everybody is over here focusing on SK they may just let down their guard.

I think mafia's natural inclination would be to show the discussion as being anti-town since mafia in the end wants everybody to look suspicious. This leans my initial scum hunting towards those who planted seeds of accusations without actually driving to get others to follow. I see this in Pop's post #40 and Rishi has done a little bit of it (though I am more concerned with what I saw as hypocritical statements by Rishi). It may pan out to be nothing, but it has given me a starting point which is all I need to get entrenched into a game.

This lets me know just how much I still have to learn... first bolded part I completely agree with. Second bolded part I also completely agree with, but was completely ignorant to that being an obvious extension to my "sk will alter their play if we're focused on him" thoughts...

You should read Spyrex's signature (follow link). WIFOM is not the world's worst starting point for suspicion - especially if you believe what you quoted OGML as saying in your newbie game (I do) about early game votes requiring far less than later votes.

Yeah, I've read that (twice, actually). I more or less agree with it - i have argued in other games that not all WIFOM is bad. But in my judgement (which has understandably become questionable), pops post sounded more like the wifom I should be worried about...

BC's riddling power is greater than thine, Rhinox

I still don't get it "What has mail, never clinking," how does that relate to a fish? p.s. now I feel like not only and idiot, but a retarded idiot...

[Rhinox]

In a similar vein, saying that you would always vote a self-voter is a policy that might allow you to look past the specific situation in your rationalizing a vote. If you’re not judging as each situation allows itself, it looks like the vote is more important than the tell.

Not quite sure exactly what you're saying here... can you rephrase for me before I attempt to answer? I don't see a correlation between my policy voting of self voters, and my rationalization (albeit, bad) for voting pops earlier.

This just feels unnatural to me because it looks preemptive. I don’t think anyone was questioning your ability in which you would have to explain yourself, so I don’t know why you did. Can you take the heat? Do you think it’s undeserved?

I don't think its pre-emptive... I've been caught twice being contradictory WRT my vote on pops. The heat is not undeserved... My explanation for it (that I'd been playing like an idiot) was the result of being asked directly about my contradictions... so whats premature about it?

[Rhinox]

I am only relating it because you said you would always vote self-voters. I think that by acting through policy you are not looking at the individual situation because your suspicion and rationalization was there before a player committed the self-vote. Even if you have a meta on a scumtell, there are always exceptions. By not looking at the individual situation, it tells me you are more concerned with putting a vote on the board than finding a way to prevent it.

In a practical application for our current situation, it may be that you rushed into the pops vote because it looked like something you had seen before and inherently knew to respond with a vote. But I don't know how strong your suspicions are. And, it looks like you gave some critical analysis by asking questions.

Ok, I think I get what you're saying, and i think its a fallacy, but I can't think of the name.

Basically, you're saying that because I say in some situations that I vote strictly out of policy, that means in all situations I must base my vote on a policy without considering context (i.e. Good townie book says Action A is scummy, always vote when a player performs action A).

First thing, this is something you shuld be able to easily verify or disprove by looking at my past games and seeing if thats how I act. You were in 2 or 3 of my 6 completed games, so it shouldn't be too hard to do.

Secondly, even if you found that all of my votes seemed based on some idea of a by the book policy, would that say anything about my allignment?

That's true that you had to alter your statements but I don't think you needed to apologize or give an excuse. You trying to diffuse the situation while you had, what 2 votes?, only makes me look more carefully at what you're trying to move past.

I really wasn't thinking about the number of votes I had... based on the situation, I think a "oops, my bad, wasn't paying attention, didn't remember what I said, sorry" type of response was very apprpriate... maybe you have more of a problem with the wordiness of my statement rather than the actual content?

@Red: I think our argument is at an impasse. I think the point Rishi and I are both arguing is that regardless of the # of scum, or the type of scum, today's lynch will be who we think is acting the scummiest. It won't matter if there are 3 or 4 total scum, or if there are 3 goons, 4 goons, 3 goons + sk, or 2 goons + 2 goons. Do you think our lynch choice, or our way of determining our lynch choice should change based on assuming any setup with any number of scum?

I see your point about looking for connections, but the more its talked about, the more its subject to WIFOM... thats basically been my point since this conversation began. If any scum know you're going to be coming back to this point some time in the future to look for connections, then scum will go out of their way to make sure there aren't any connections, or set up false connections.

Maybe I just have a narrow view right now, but all i'm getting out of our back and forth is you saying, "its stupid to assume there isn't an sk", followed by me saying "thats not what I'm assuming, but how does assuming there is one help us?", followed by you responding with "its stupid to assume there isn't an sk."

I don't know if anyone else questioned this. What's the difference between scummy and suspicious? This is bordering on doublespeak.

Really? I think there is a clear distinction between scummy and suspicious. Its the nature of the game to be suspicious of everyone until we are given definitive reasons to believe otherwise. I would still be somewhat suspicious of even the most pro-town player in the game if they're not confirmed town, even if they never did a single thing I could call scummy.

Regarding bio, I'm suspicious of all the early talk about the sk, but i wouldn't call it scummy right now.

[Rhinox]

It's fun making Rhinox's head sore.

My head was sore before your riddles

Vote: Rhinox I challenged him on appeal to emotion, and more or less all i'm getting is him saying that that's the only defense he has for himself. Issues like totally misinterpreting me (ties in with "scum skim threads") and contradicting himself about his suspicions (ties in with scum aren't genuinely suspicious of anyone) are major issues. Appeal to emotion just makes it worse.

If the appeal to emotion is what making you vote me now, then I might as well just stop talking because there is nothing I could say to change your opinion of me. What I have said is honest. I know you don't have a problem using wifom, so do you really think that it would have been beneficial for me to be THAT honest as scum? Also, for what its worth, contradictions like the ones I did are scummy on paper, but I have never caught scum being so obviously contradictory between comments 1 or 2 pages apart. On the other hand, I've seen townies be even more contradictory than I was, and were lynched for it... like I said, for what its worth.

[Rhinox]

IMO that is the truth behind all actions and cases in the game. It is now Pop's job to determine for himself if your action was scummy - right now he obviously thinks it is. If we learned something from our last game, (mod referenced Thesp's "defenses are overrated" policy) it is that we need to analyze each action, not really the explanation of the action.

Is that a wiki article or MD discussion thread? I haven't heard of that policy, but I can understand what I think it means in theory. Would like to hear a full conversation or article about it.

The problem is we just played a game where the scum defended their contradictions and stuck with their accusations (this is what you present your alternative as). This got him lynched. With that example fresh in your head, your only option as scum would be to admit mistake and try to look vulnerable to gain sympathy.

I wouldn't exactly say the example is fresh in my head, even though it was my most recent completed game. Realize, I wasn't exactly in the game during all of day 1. Yes I went back and read the whole thread, but what stuck with me the most about raider (i.e. what I thought got him lynched) was that he was not scumhunting, and admitted to it. I would honestly have to go back and read all of D1 of that game again to figure out what contradiction you're talking about. All I can do is link you to a game where a townie was even more contradictory than I was just now... Mini 716

Look at Deuxime Octopus. There were many examples, but this was probably the worst/most obvious:

Here's my top 3 scum candidates. After this post, I suggest you lynch me, find out I'm a boring old vanilla townie (yes that's a claim) and then go after these scumsuckers in order:

1. zu_Faul

2. Rhinox

3. Joonster

The only reason I don't say Panzer is because I think it would be too obvious.

It would also be nice if you actually include reasons (I expect more than what I quote above) as to why I am supposed to be your number 1 scum-probable

Well, you brilliant man you, you may not have noticed that this was not an ordered list, and that - lo and behold - I did provide a reason!

this still makes me *facepalm*. Yes, DO was town.
------------------------------

vote rhinox. This is a good place for the first strong wagon of the day IMO.

Aparently nothing I can say to stop it, since my defenses are overrated

[Rhinox]

hopefully, this post won't be too big... want to make sure I answer everyones questions though.

RC 152

That's true, the game could be 100% vanilla.

Let's say it is, has the discussion then, in your mind, been useless?

Of course not, but when the setup isn't known, or at least 100% known, I think it helps scum more then town to speculate about the setup. You said so yourself...

I guess what I'm trying to say, why do I have the burden of proof? Why do I have to prove to you how it's helpful to discuss the probability of an SK and you don't have to prove how discussing the probability of "dunno wtf the roles could be??? mystery mod!!!" is helpful.

I think you're fabricating a burden of proof. The point I've been trying to make is that nothing should change D1 based on any idea of a setup. You're argument is that we should prepare for the worst case scenario, but you've yet to explain what preparation we should make or how to support your argument. You've done an excellent job skillfully dodging that question, though...

If there were two killing parties I would assume (again, trying my best not to push the situation as far as I can) that those parties who may or may not have night actions would necessarily act in a way that would be more approriate to having two killing parties and not one.

So, you insult everyone by thinking that any town power roles would be too stupid to take into consideration any possible roles when making their night choices? Thats what all this has been about? So you can state the obvious, in an attempt to look like a perfect little highly informative townie?

It would make sense to lynch someone on the grounds that they are scum period.

Thanks for agreeing with my point.

Your questions are becoming so obtuse. Okay, let's not assume there is an SK. Let's assume that everyone is Vanilla. Let's assume that we will lynch a townie today. Let's assume that all discussion today is kind of pointless because we don't know enough. Let's assume today that the night actions will give us weird results therefore giving us a kinda crappy Day 2 discussion as well.

You see where I'm going with this? Why are you trying to draw a line on what is and isn't helpful to the town? To arbitrarily say that all SK talk on Day 1 is useless without any regard for the implications it might have later in the game sounds naive to me.

This is a complete distortion of my argument. Now that this conversation about sk's has been had, maybe later in the game there will be something we can use later in the game... however, it is my belief that the town will have been better off not having this conversation. Scum can use this information NOW, and have an effect on any events that will happen between now and LATER. This might mean that scum will make sure this conversation means nothing, or it might mean that scum will be able to set up false connections. I'm no more drawing a line between what is pro-town or not than you are... we just have a different idea of where that line is.

Oh, ok... My bad.

This isn't good enough for me. You had a vested interest in tying me so closely with pops as it helped your argument against him.

Do you read the posts, or just ignore all the context? That comment was in regards to pops seemingly allowing my vote to stand despite my obvious contradiction. He cleared it up, I said my bad for thinking he was just conceding the point.

I love your salt story Spy. What troubles me is why you aren't following through with it.

I'm content with voting Rhinox, and I read what you're saying as borderline defending Rhinox by implying that the case against him is any less valid than one already out there.

I got the feeling I was the one who spilled the salt in Spy's story... I see nothing to indicate spy is not following it in his only post after posting the story. If you like the story, RC, there must be something about it you agree with. Which parts of Spy's story do you agree with? disagree with?

It is

always

pro-town to assume the worst (e.g. an SK). Neither you, Rishi, Rhinox, nor OGML have proven to me otherwise.

You're right. A mafia player would have no interest in convincing the town we should be hunting for an sk, instead of the final mafia player. Oh wait, did I link to Meerkat manor mafia yet? Notice how at the end of the game, CKD (the final scum) argued that we should lynch strangercoug (a townie) on the grounds that he was an sk. CKD even claimed a predator cop aka sk cop to do it. It might have won him the game, except the town still had 2 lynch choices left, so we were able to know he was lying and lynch him the next day.

Anyways, this is a pretty clear example where its NOT always "pro-town to assume the worst (e.g. an SK)". If there is one situation, there are probably many more, just as there are probably some situations where assuming an sk IS protown. Bolding always and speaking in absolutes like that is kinda suspicious to me...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bio 137

There may be an article about it, but I don't know. I am just taking what incognito said at face value and analyzing the statement on its own. A good scum player will be able to post-rationalize any mistake they make, so the initial action is more important than the subsequent defense. Lack of justification or poor reasons for an action would IMO add to the suspicion of the original action. A good defense would hold the suspicion at its initial level.

Well you've created a bit of a paradox in logic there... so, you're saying if I'm scum, that I'm a good scum player who will be able to explain away my mistake. Although even good scum players can make some mistakes, do you think a good scum player would make the obvious mistake that I made?

Also... what incog posted is all well and good... but ever since CKD convinced the town in, again, meerkat manor mafia that someone useing a phrase similar to "To be honest..." is a tell that proves they are being dishonest about something, I've been skeptical of every new tell or strategy that I've heard that someone says is valid. What you're saying may be logical, but I don't believe that defenses can't alleviate suspicion beyond the original level. Especially, looking from a 3rd party perspective. A 3rd party doesn't know if the accuser's suspicions are genuine or fabricated, and doesn't know the same of the accused defenses. A back and forth between attack and defense may entirely eliminate any suspicion from one particular action (or, maybe it will arouse more suspicion).

For example, player X does something that could be scummy. Player A is suspicious and starts attacking player X. Player B is also suspicious, but doesn't say anything to hear the back and forth between player A and player X. At the end, player B's suspicions might grow, shrink, or remain the same.

The best defense for any suspicious action is a mountain of overwhelming town play to go alongside the action.

This I agree with. Unfortunately for me, there just hasn't been enough time for ANYONE to have stacked up a mountain of overwhelming town play... if you guys quicklynch me, that won't change. If you don't, then maybe I can turn around and be more pro-town.

Is being pro-town after the fact enough to defend against a previous suspicious action?

Take this example. Now your explanation may very well be true, but the only way the defense could eliminate the initial suspicion would be if I believed you 100% about your explanation.

So you don't 100% believe my explanation. Fair enough... I haven't really given you or anyone a reason to trust anything I've said. So I guess the question I should be asking everyone right now is if the initial suspicion from my contradiction is strong enough for a lynch, are I can't say anything to alleviate that initial suspicion, are you all prepared to end the day now with a quick lynch on me, or do you feel conversation should continue?

I would have seen that as suspicious. I am not reading the link just because I understand your example and the point you are making. If the offense was on Day 1, it might be a lynchable offense for me depending on the scumminess of others. Later in the game, I would definitely need more than just one suspicious infraction from a player in order to lynch them.

That was on Day 1, but near the end (like 20 pages in I think). There were other suspicious comments besides that one comment, but the point I was making is that an obvious contradiction does not necessarily mean the player is scum.

That is a little extreme, but I think you know that.

You're right... maybe I was being a little melodramatic... but does it make what I said any less true?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jahudo 136

I did not try to correlate them as a fact for your gaming all the time, I just wanted to investigate it in this instance. I also said in that same post that there were factors going against this conclusion. You asked questions and your suspicion might not have been that strong as we are not that far into the game. But I do think that you may have leapt into the vote and it could have been a decision that was made by conventional wisdom as opposed to your own feelings.
----------------------
Possibly. I’ll look into it if I think you are doing it later in the game when the stakes are higher.

Ok then... so I guess to answer your original question, my vote on pops was not based on any idea of a policy idea of what I feel I should vote for, and what I shouldn't, and you have the option to look into my past games to verify if you feel its necessary.

However, I will say that I've been trying something new in some of my games that hasn't exactly been working... I feel as a town player, I should always be able to identify who is "scummiest". As such, I should always be able to place my vote for who I feel is scummiest. I'm not really a fan of players who never vote because they're waiting to get an idea of who's scum - it always sounds like fence-sitting to me. I guess I just tried a little too hard to conform to my own idea of a standard, when I'm not quite ready as a player yet to be there.

How would you define scummy to go along with your usage of suspicious here?

I kinda feel like this is splitting hairs... I'm not quite sure how best to answer this. Someone is scummy when they say something that makes me think they're scum. I can be suspicious of someone even if they've never given me a definitive reason to think they're scum. For an example, in our newbie game, even though I was scum and knew you were town, you weren't considered scummy at all. But I don't think that meant that everyone else didn't suspect you at all, or didn't have suspicions, or thought you were confirmed town. Thats really the best way I can answer the question.


P.S. that is all. Sorry korts, I know I'm causing you a lot of reading

[Rhinox]

I've explained about as best as I can how it can be imperative for a town to be in the mindset that there are two killing parties based primarily on night actions which I think could/would be significantly different on the basis that there is a third-party in this game. If you disagree with that, you disagree with that, but do not pretend like I haven't said it more than once today.

I absolutely disagree with your reasonings for talking about 2 killing parties. I see it as a BS cover for speculating on the setup and distracting the town from scum hunting. Everybody in the game knows exactly what roles are possible. You saying "BEWARE OF TEH SK" isn't going to enlighten anyone...

Night actions are necessarily dependant on the individual's prediction of the roles in the setup. Do you disagree with that?

I wish I could do this without being accused of rolefishing... so, hypothetically, and rhetorically, I'm a watcher, or jailer, or doc... I could assume there is only mafia, I could assume there is mafia + sk, or I can assume nothing about the mafia roles other than whats possible... I don't see how any of my actions change by assuming there is an sk, compared to not assuming one...

I mean, how am I insulting anyone?

You're the one telling everyone not to think about the possibility of an SK.

All I want to make clear is that it's my intent that every player in this town should necessarily consider there to be an SK in this game until proven otherwise.

No, not really, but since you're either content in twisting everything I say into something I didn't say, I guess I better respond to this too...

I didn't say "ignore the sk, assume theres not one in the game b/c there's no evidence there is". What I have said is there is no reason to assume anything at all about the scum factions until there is evidence to support any assumption.

Whether or not they would've come to that conclusion on their own is not my concern. If anything, I have to assume that a lot of players would not have based on certain players antipathy toward the idea that someone bring up setup possibilities.

We all know the setup possibilies... stated very clearly after the rules... And you still haven't shown how any particular town role should play D1 differently by assuming there is an sk.

Yeah. You know what, yeah. I'll label myself as "stating the obvious". If you, Jahudo, or Huntress wants to run a case on that basis, so be it.

Stating the obvious can be a way to say something that appears to be pro-town, even though the reality is that nothing need be said on the subject at all...

But you're right, that in and of itself is nothing... unless its all you've done all game. I've seen minimal scumhunting from you otherwise... even your comments directed towards other players have me as the subject matter... Either you're 100% tunnelvisioned on me, or you think you're gonna piss me off enough to start acting rediculous so you can justify lynching me.

Moving on... I actually like quote wars

If you want my personal opinion, I think that's a weak idea of a tell given the context of this setup. There's little room to run with it.

I think the town should decide the strength of any tell in context... not what you say is strong or weak.

I think this whole SK thing was blown way, way out of proportion. I think I've made it clear that I wanted to move on multiple times, but certain players continue to drag my name in the mud regardless of how I approach the situation.

I think you're being paranoid if you think people are "dragging your name through the mud." Has anyone even voted for you for any of this? I know I haven't... Huntress did I guess... But, You can't have a conversation with someone without thinking you're being attacked? Sounds overdefensive, imo...

So if you are going to sit there and say the best tell you've found in this game so far is that I've been "stating the obvious", then so be it.

Another distortion... aside from this post, please quote where I said anything to point to me even thinking "stating the obvious" was a scum tell, let alone the best one I've found... I want to see it in my words, not your paranoid interpretation/blatant misrepresentation of what I actually said.

I don't accept you putting our two positions on the same platform. You're entirely the one who is drawing a line. I'm drawing no such line. I don't make arbitrary lines on what a town should and should not discuss in regards to a setup's possibilities. I don't think information should be censored because "we're at Day 1" or "we don't know for sure if such-and-such is a factor" or "we don't know this mod" or any other such nonsense.

I don't see anyone censoring anything... I see you forcing a view onto the town and instead of justifying why, you attack anyone who questions you or disagrees with you.

I mean, I'm sure whoever is mafia loves your argument right now about sks... get the town paranoid about an sk, so maybe the town PR's spend tonight looking for the ghost sk instead of looking for mafia, or looking for scum in general. And on top of that, you're helping the mafia even more by trying to get me mislynched.

Basically, your "line in the sand" is that anything can be pro-town, so don't hold anything back. My line is that things that do not clearly benefit the town should not be said. A potential to help the town in the long run is not good enough when the conversation will help scum now. You still haven't shown how anything you've said regarding the SK discussion is helping the town right now on D1 catch scum.

Is this Day 5?

I'm sorry y'all made a poor decision. I don't need to read another game to know that scum try to trick the town to keep themselves from being lynched.

Actually, we still won. Who cares if it was day 5 or not... you said that it was

ALWAYS

pro-town to "assume the worst (i.e. an sk)"... you said nothing about it being day 1 only, or anything else. You said always...

Cry me a river, Rhinox.

Resulting to

ad hom

now to try to get me lynched, or at least get a rouse out of me? That statement was meant for BC, and not you. So, why the need to respond? What does this statement add to anything? How is this scumhunting?

No, I didn't say that. I said it ran it's course, as in, I thought there wasn't much left to be discussed. Never claimed that it was "better not to" talk about it.

The fact the you're pretty much using the whole conversation as justification for keeping your vote on me means that the topic obviously hasn't ran its course. Don't just think you can say "there's nothing more for me to say" and expect me just fold without defending against your smears. If you really wanted to be the bigger man, you wouldn't HAVE to have the last word...

I was pushed into saying it. I was content with leaving it at a disagreement over whether or not setup discussion was good for the town on Day 1, but Rhinox and Rishi both insisted that I give them a reason as to why having multiple killing parties makes a determining factor in this game. This forced my hand into talking about things I would rather not have talked about. I'm wondering why you're pressuring me because of this, and not Rhinox or Rishi.

Here's why I "pushed it" aka asked for an explanation:

Essentially, it's my opinion that forcing the town to talk about the SK may help the mafia, but in general I think it's good practice to talk about all roles and their implications to the game regardless of what day it is.

...because you said in your own opinion, talking about the SK may help the mafia, and you continue to talk about it. If you also think this conversation is pro-town, you better damned well be able to explain why. You still haven't done so. Hey, if you can't, you can't. Just admit it so we can move on and actually scum hunt. At least I was man enough to admit when I messed up.

Right. Later at an undisclosed date depending on when you say it's okay.

Thats a pretty big distortion of what huntress and I have both said, since I seem to remember you directing a similar comment towards me. Firstly, the date is neither undisclosed, nor arbitrary. There are some clear points where it would be beneficial to speculate on the scum killing factions:
1)when there is more than 1 kill in a night.
2)when 3 mafia players have been killed.
3)when there are no kills in a night.
4)When a town PR reveals with information that might give insight into the factions.

Until 1 of those 4 things happen, I don't care how many times you repeat to take an SK into all considerations, I'm just hunting factionless scum. Its worked for me so far. I've never lost a game because I failed to account for a possible SK on D1. Have you?

Second point... what gives you the right to proclaim when its ok or not ok to talk about anything?

Being mafia is, like, a million times as much fun as being town.

You seem to be having a lot of fun so far...

(in case you can't tell, this comment was meant as a joke)

do you think a good scum player would make the obvious mistake that I made?

I missed this little gem, when did he say that? If I ever write a dictionary I want this quote to be listed under WIFOM. This is definitive WIFOM.

Wow... first, lets revist some context, since you still haven't shown you consider it before saying anything... In fact, in this instance you admit to not even remember reading where I said it originally... so here you go:

There may be an article about it, but I don't know. I am just taking what incognito said at face value and analyzing the statement on its own.

A good scum player will be able to post-rationalize any mistake they make, so the initial action is more important than the subsequent defense.

Lack of justification or poor reasons for an action would IMO add to the suspicion of the original action.

A good defense would hold the suspicion at its initial level.

Well you've created a bit of a paradox in logic there... so, you're saying if I'm scum, that I'm a good scum player who will be able to explain away my mistake. Although even good scum players can make some mistakes, do you think a good scum player would make the obvious mistake that I made?

Bolded to assist with my explanation. Bio was arguing that even if I had a stellar defense for my early contradictions, that it wouldn't erase the suspicion because a

good scum

would be able to post-rationalize the mistake. So, if I had a good defense, that would make me a good scum. The paradox in logic is that although even good scum can make some mistakes, do you think good scum would make such an obvious mistake as I have?

It wasn't meant as a defense of myself, RC, it was actually a question to bio. Since I didn't exactly have a stellar defense to go along with my mistake, there is nothing to indicate I'm playing like any allignment of a good player so far.

But I understand why you don't consider the context of anything, RC. Its easy to fabricate a case when you ignore the context...

No wonder Rhinox doesn't think WIFOM is bad, lol.

Again with the distortions... Yes, I stated in this thread that I have argued before that not all wifom was bad. There are times when its ok to use wifom, and times when its not. Here is an example when its ok to use wifom:

Player A is at L-1 and everybody is just waiting for a hammer from player B. Player B doesn't hammer, and instead brings up a case on player C. Player C is lynched scum. The next day, someone suggests that Player B might have been bussing player C. Player B says "thats stupid. If I were scum, I would have just hammered player B instead of derailing the wagon to deliberately lynch my scum partner."

In other words, its OK to use wifom when its true - when both sides of the wifom aren't equally beneficial to the player.

In my situation, it is true that I've never seen scum make such an obvious contradiction so early in the game as I have... If that was my only defense for my actions, then sure, go ahead and call WIFOM and lynch me for it... but I've said a lot to explain my self, only a small part being this particular point.

Also, I'm suspicious of pops due to his early wifom post about bio when this whole sk discussion was beginning... I've been clear about that for a while now. So what makes you think I don't think WIFOM is or can be bad?

unvote, vote: Rhinox

Now this is interesting... On one hand, maybe you're trying to make a point, or just be an ass, by unvoting the player you're ALREADY VOTING FOR and voting them again... On the other hand, this makes me think you're not playing serious enough to remember who you were voting for. This really makes me think you are just fabricating this case on me - if you had genuine suspicions of me, you would have remembered you were already voting me...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That sounds like your using its obviousness as a defense. What is obvious about it that scum are not expected to make it? Couldn’t both scum and town accidentally make it?

Of course... I think my paragraph above should explain for you though. The key word was

good

scum, and was meant as a question for bio and not a defense of myself.

I think you are misreading the groups sentiment to your wagon. I don’t think anyone has been saying lynch yet.

It doesn't have to be said... a vote is a representation of a desire to lynch. If some quick votes get piled on me and I end up quick lynched, nobody voting for me right now gets an out by saying "I wasn't ready to lynch anyone yet"

Obviously, I view the wagon on me as a serious threat to me being mislynched, and I'm acting accordingly. Are you saying I shouldn't think that I might be lynched, and that I'm just some sort of utility wagon? That I shouldn't be defending myself right now because I'm not really going to be lynched?

[Rhinox]

This post is a placeholder. Will post real stuff after I caught up with more urgent games.

hmm? ...

Also, posting for the sake of posting? Admitting to it? Shame.

Also, did you expect not to be called out for posting for the sake of posting when you yourself admitted to it?

Let me help. Did you admit to posting for the sake of posting? Why did you post for the sake of posting? Why did you admit to it?

Why does this not apply to you?

[Rhinox]

Why does this not apply to you?

Umm, I explained it here as well as in our other game; this kind of posting from me is only so that I don't weasel out in the face of a challenging read-up. I'm inherently lazy and I sometimes have to force myself into working by having the prospect of bringing shame to myself loom over me...

Nevertheless I have to back down on this one. Semester just started and I'm tired. I promise that this game is now the first in line.

Oh, ok... guess I missed the explanation the first time. (and I also try to ignore what you say in our other game when I'm reading this one, so things don't start blending together and I start getting biased towards you having the same (or opposite) role in each game )

My meta says you play a good scum, so I think you can post-rationalize any mistake you made.

But then, maybe a good scum play off that knows they’re good and wants the WIFOM of not playing to the meta I have on them

haha... but if you look at my sig, you'll see that newbie game was the only game I've been mafia in so far. If you wanna see a game of me playing horrendus as scum (sk), check out Mini 688 where I got myself vigged D1, and the town won easily (meh, it was 2 mafia + 1 sk vs. 9 townies with some decent PRs).

Anyways, my current belief is that I don't need to alter my playstyle in any way as town or scum, because I think I play pretty much the same as scum as I do as town... but that could just be because I haven't been mafia enough to become aware of changes to my play. I've also never been in a situation where I've had the added dynamic of scum partners, unless you count the short time Prof. Guppy was alive...

So what I'm trying to say nicely is, I think your meta on me as scum is unreliable because of the small sample size. If you really wanted to meta-analyze me, I'd rather see you looking at my town games and decide how differently/similarly I'm playing now as opposed to when I was town.

Take Mafia 87 for example. I had a hunch Vi was scum for meta reasons, even though I'd never seen Vi play as scum. But I had seen him play as town 3 times, and saw some inconsisties with those examples.

[Rhinox]

OGML 195)

Given that Rhinox's posts up to that point (and, well always) are basically little novellas, and he had had something to say on just about everything else that had happened in the game, his complete lack of interest in what I had said about you was something I found telling.

I've already responded to this once. After you take my response into account, I'll clarify anything you still need clarified.

I have to hope this has been discussed pretty heavily by now, but wtf Rhinox, you're defending yourself entirely with appeal to emotion, and you're simultaneously using flattery on everyone else in the game.

This gets you top marks on my scum report card. I'll hold off til I finish reading, but based on this alone you should hang today.

Point conceded. Whats said is said, and trying to defend this point any further will only continue to look like like appeals/flattery, etc.

Here, Rhinox specifically works on flattering bio by appealing to his authority on the subject. Silly padawan.

Actually, you missed the whole point of that statement - That i missed the obvious corrolary to my theory that sk will alter their play if they're aware the town is focused on them - that mafia will alter their play and possibly relax if they think the sk is the focus. This is the best point I head yet about why the talk about the sk has been OK.

OGML 196)

And this was my issue with what Korts did, which you never seemed to find interesting enough to comment on. It doesn't say anything about alignment, thus making it an ideal play for scum.

I've already responded to this once (allegedly ignoring korts). After you take my response into account, I'll clarify anything you still need clarified.

OGML 198)

Ah, the specter of a quicklynch. If thats not enough to scare people off your wagon, gosh I just don't know what is.

I've got news for you. A real, honest to god day one quicklynch will not happen outside of a newbie game, and even then I'm not convinced it will happen. Whats going on now is by no means quick, and there has been more than enough content generated up to this point to offset whatever theoretical devastating repercussions of a quicklynch are brought up when someone has no other way to get people to stop voting for them.
---------------------
stallin' and stallin' and stallin'

Its in the interest of my win condition to prevent my lynch regardless of my allignment. I feel the wagon on my was because of my initial controdiction - If I would have tried to ignore it ever happened and moved on, that would have been scummy. Honestly defending it was also viewed as scummy. I could have BSed some excuse that wouldn't have looked as scummy (probably), but it would have been fabricating a lie only meant to save myself. If I'm lynched, it was decided on Page 3 (-ish... somewhere around there). No matter how I acted afterwords, there was no erasing the scumminess. Of course, in the last 6 pages there has been a lot of opinions about it, which would be very helpful tomorrow if I'm lynched and my allignment is revealed. I just hope that the town utilizes the information, and it isn't minimized by the argument that "Rhinox was an idiot, any town player would have found him scummy and lynched him, so theres no reliable way to find scum on his wagon".

Re Rhinox 181: My meta of you as scum is that you're good. My meta of you as town is that you're good. So, similar to how you picked up on Vi in Mafia 87 for inconsistencies, the fact that your appeal to emotion to the Nth degree defense here is horrendous, is an inconsistency with your usual standard of play. You yourself explained why this may be so - its your first game with multiple scum partners, and certainly your first game without a self-destructive scum partner. Thus, the differences.

So what will your new conclusion be when I show up town tomorrow morning? (hint: don't you think that even a good player can have a bad game?)

RC 199)

I disagree with this. I think the town should constantly be aware of how many people are left, what the worst possible number of scum there are, what roles they are working with, etc...

This should all be on a townie's (or really even a scum's) mind before they vote to lynch, Day 1 or not.

But you can do that without assuming anything about factions... in a mini, I always assume there are 4 total scum.

I have, but you're not willing to say that you agree/disagree with me (you'd prefer to talk in circles).

I have, but you're not willing to say that you agree/disagree with me (you'd prefer to talk in circles).

Without being an ass, I think you have been asked some questions that you haven't answered clearly/dodged skillfully.

Seeing as how I'm part of the town, doesn't my opinion deserve the same weight as anyone elses?

Sure does... but you seem to be incinuating that you're opinion is more important.

(emphasis added).

You were being sarcastic here, correct?

I was actually trying to express suprise at you saying the purpose of the entire sk conversation was to warn town PR's about the presence of an sk... Perhaps I implied a bit much in the sentence you bolded, but you also misrepped me by saying that I thought it was the strongest scum tell in the game so far...

Rhinox 171 wrote:
I mean, I'm sure whoever is mafia loves your argument right now about sks... get the town paranoid about an sk, so maybe the town PR's spend tonight looking for the ghost sk instead of looking for mafia, or looking for scum in general.

RC wrote:
Do you think that's what I'm trying to do?

No I don't think that was you're intention... I think it would be too risky to do if you were mafia. But I do feel it is an unfortunate side effect to the conversation.

It's passive-aggressive. You were saying that you haven't given anyone a reason to trust what you said.

When people say things like that about themselves, I get worried. I get worried because a player knows whether or not he should be trusted or shouldn't.

If you don't believe people should trust you, why should I?

Ironically, this sort of thing pretty much cost the town the game in my most recent completed game. I said something to the effect of not trusting my own scum-hunting ability, so the obvtown player with the most town influence didn't trust me either when I was trying to make a case that actually was on the last scum remaining... the last scum ended up winning...

I'm not voting you based on any of this SK stuff. I'm voting you based on WIFOM, your attempts at pairing people off, and because of these little passive-aggressive manipulations you've been using to get people to feel sorry for you.

Ok, I'll go through these 1 by 1:

use of WIFOM:

I concede that a lot of my defense is WIFOM and thus inherantly not trustworthy... But it was the truth. I've hinted at this above, but I'll be more direct now... consider the other ways I could have responded: I could have either A)Told the WIFOM truth, as I did... B)Ignored the accusations alltogether... C)Fabricated a BS excuse. Considering those are my only options, is there any sort of defense I could have used that wouldn't have made me look scummier than the initial offense? Maybe C, but it would be lies. A or B both make me look scummier. I think B is worse than A, actually. Maybe I could have used A with less appeals and less WIFOM, and made it more concise, but that is the curse to my long-winded nature of posting.

attempts at pairing people off:

Wait a minute... this explains a lot... You think I was trying to pair you and pops as scum mates? That couldn't be further from the truth... yes, I said that I thought pops was defending you, But a player defending another player does not mean that both are scum. Maybe pops legitamately didn't agree with the accusations against you. Maybe pops is scum and knows you're town and was defending a townie to look town or make a townie friend. Based on the fact that I actually asked for pops opinion, and the subsequent conversation we had, I came to the conclusion that pops' feelings he said about you were genuine.

little passive-aggressive manipulations you've been using to get people to feel sorry for you:

as I said to OGML above, whats said is said, and any attempt to further defend this point will only look progressively worse. I'll concede the scumminess of it, and hope its not enough to get me lynched.

I think those are fair points, a shame that no one brought those up earlier.

No, but then again I've never played on MS with an SK before. XD

Why is it a shame? are they not valid points because they were brought up now, and not earlier? Why or why not?

I have just as much right as anyone else, and I say it should always be ok to talk about an SK. I do not set limitations on what should or shouldn't happen for a town to talk about roles in a setup.

Well then I disagree with your philosophy... I think limitations should be set. When I'm not sure talking about topic A will help the town, but I think it may help the mafia, then I avoid topic A. I don't start talking about topic A hoping that something pro-town will evolve out of it, all the while thinking that its definately helping scum.

Regardless whether or not you think WIFOM is a good tell, do you dispute that this is a genuine case of it?

Its genuinely WIFOM, but not the kind that says anything about my allignment, IMO. Its similar to saying "I don't think player X is scum today because player Y was nked, and I don't think player X would have nked player Y." Its definately WIFOM, but depending on the context, doesn't say a thing about the player using the WIFOM.

It was Rhinox's position that talking about the SK on Day 1 is useless, regardless of the implications it might have later in the game, because he thought we would know at some later date.

Thats either an innocent misread of Rhinox 55, or an intentional misrep of it:

we should know tomorrow or at some point down the road if there is an sk to deal with, so why worry about it before we know?

Should be interpretted as (and this has been my position in the entire conversation): We don't need to specifically worry about an sk until we have reason to believe there is an sk - until then, hunting factionless scum is the best we can do.

I want so badly to play the newbie card right now ;_;

I think you just did

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sorry IAUN, not ignoring you... just having a hard time keeping track of everybody who needs answered.

If all you mean by 'suspicious' is "It's possible they're scum, because it's always possible that somebody is scum", then why bother pointing out specific behaviours as 'suspicious'? Isn't everything anyone says 'suspicious', by your definition?

I guess the best way for me to define this is:

suspicious = potentially scummy.

suppose a replacement player A jumped in right now and said something like, "IAUN is obvscum" and voted. That would be highly suspicious, but not necessarily scummy. What would follow would probably be a barrage of questions asking "Why?". If player A has some very good reasons, then it probably would no longer be considered suspicious nor scummy. If Player A had no good reasons, then they would be seen as scummy and the suspicions would be validated. To tie this into my previous expanation (to show that I am indeed saying the same thing in a different way), I would still call a player who has done nothing scummy but is not confirmed town suspicious, because they still have the potential to be scum.

So, these two quotes are kind of contradictory. In one, you're arguing that power roles will act the same whether there's an SK or not, but in the other you're saying that Coyote is helping the scum by sending the power roles on an SK hunt. How does that work?

I don't think I'm being contradictory at all. I don't think town roles should play any differently by assuming anything about scum factions, so if anything thats consistent with my suspicions of RC for insisting that town roles should play differently by assuming an sk.

[Rhinox]

You know what I find really odd... the same people calling me scum are some of the same people voting RC right now for pretty much the same points I've been arguing about RC all game... not too sure what to make of it right now, but it makes me think the wagon on RC right now is highly scum motivated...

[Rhinox]

bio, I guess it would be because a lot of the arguments being made against RC by the players that were voting for me were basically the same points I was arguing in my back and forth with RC... I find it odd that if I'm so obvscum (according to some of the players) that my points of concern with RC are being used to justify the wagon on him right now...

OGML even goes so far as to suggest that RC and I are each scum members of different factions - I find that a completely baseless assumption, considering its D1 and there is no reason to be assuming anything about factions, nor evidence to support the assumption... well, maybe OGML knows something about the scum factions I don't. I get the feeling that assumption was made because its the only way he can justify calling RC and I both scum. Also, conveniently I suppose, its a way for OGML to hide lining up lynches. Lynch one of us today. If town, the other looks more scum. If scum (sk), the other is a member of the other faction.

It also makes sense that scum would go after RC first when pushing a one or the other, or both scum scenario to set up mislynches - 1 or the other type situations typically don't work because of the potential false dilemna aspect of the argument. If one of us are lynched town, it probably wouldn't fly to call the other scum solely on our massive disagreement. But even if RC is lynched town first, I can still be tomorrow's mislynch based on my bad play up til now.

There is also the possibility (which exists in my case) that the back and forth between RC and yourself has shown your responses to him as more town than his responses to you. This is not to assume that it was a scum vs. town debate occurring.

This is true, but I dont get that feeling from some players... Its very clear that some players are calling both RC and I obvscum.

[Rhinox]

I know this is directed at OGML but I have a problem with it.

Care to elaborate?

Didn’t you say it sounded like a "bad attempt at distancing" though? As in scum distancing scum, or did you mean it sounded like scum distancing from town?

Yeah, I did say that. But that was only 1 possibility. I don't know why I didn't list every possibility. Maybe I just thought it would be assumed.

i had an argument with RC about alignment-based-ad hom.

But basically, Rhinox is adhomming himself. it's kind of funny.

Actually, I'm just pointing out the fallacy that OGML is sneaking in. Basically, OGML has said that:

1)If RC is mafia, then Rhinox is either mafia bussing or sk b/c sk want to be on a wagon of a different scum faction (note that i've never even voted for RC yet though...)
2)If RC is SK, then Rhinox is mafia because mafia want to be on a wagon of a different scum faction.
3)If RC is town, then Rhinox is scum arguing for a mislynch + plus Rhinox had a lot of scummy comments on D1.

So no matter what, OGML is setting me up to be lynched tomorrow regardless of RC's allignment.

It also works in reverse - i.e. switch RC and me in the 3 scenario's above. Only difference is that its harder to justify lynching RC tomorrow once I show up town.

RC scum and Rhinox scum do not need to be mutually exclusive. If I thought you were scum and you made a valid argument against somebody, I could not discount that argument even if you turned out to be confirmed as scum. It would be a genetic fallacy (maybe ad hominem? - I am not great with fallacy terms) to discount your arguments based on your alignment - especially without any concrete knowledge of your alignment.

Thats true, but there is a difference between not discounting an argument, and embracing it to justify lynching someone. I'm especially suspicious of OGML's use of it, in case I haven't made myself perfectly clear yet.

I'd actually be content if you were today's lynch pops, I think you've done a great job flying under the radar.

---

I'm going to go ahead and go on offense a little bit, seeing as how no one has asked for my claim yet. Usually I don't mind addressing questions brought up for me, but it really is beginning to get out of hand, especially when Huntress and Spyrex haven't even made an updated post yet. So to those of you who want me to defend myself more, I say that if the lynch is coming down to me and Rhinox, then I shall be the one to make an official case against Rhinox.

I'll go ahead and do an analysis of what I took notes on, although at the moment I would be comfortable with

anyone besides me

pops being the pick today as well (this isn't to say I'm necessarily against anyone else, it's just that these two specifically I think are the bigger offenders).

I understand why you're summarizing the case on me, but I hope you'll dedicate a similar post toward why you think pops should be today's lynch, since he's your preferred choice. Also, your crossing out of "anyone but me" to me implies that your motive for supecting me and/or pops is only one of self-preservation - you don't care who gets lynched as long as its not you.


Also, regarding the summarized case against me, I wish you would also summarize my defense to all of the points as well instead of making it look like I either didn't answer for a point, or didn't have an explanation. You present the summary in an extremely biased manner... Unless I get real close to being lynched, I'm just going to assume that everybody will realize I actually posted in the last 10 pages in response to a lot of those points and take them into consideration. A couple points you made I feel are new, or I haven't really touched on, or I feel are incorrect, so I'll address those below.

Rhinox response was that the game wasn't "fresh in his head", despite it being his most recently completed game.

The reason the offense (not the game) wasn't fresh in my head was because I was a replacement in that game... I replaced later into D2, and the offense occured D1. The game ended up going nearly 40 pages, and lasted 3 months. My opinion of the scum player was that he got lynched for admitting to not scum hunting and being an active lurker, and I still have no idea what sort of wifom slip or contradiction was made.

Cry me a river, Rhinox.

Resulting to ad hom now to try to get me lynched, or at least get a rouse out of me? That statement was meant for BC, and not you. So, why the need to respond? What does this statement add to anything? How is this scumhunting?

(emphasis added).

[RC's] Question asked toward Rishi, but I would like to answer for myself.

Threw a little contradiction in there for good measure, but my point is that I saw the earlier statement in post 154 as a means of both buddying up to bionic and, at the same time, acting completely emotionally manipulative.

See, this is what i mean about most of the things I've said have been taken out of context to use against me. Regarding the contradiction, they are completely different situations. I answered a question asked of rishi because I felt my answer was adding to the discussion. When I questioned you for jumping in, it wasn't that I felt you shouldn't respond to anything not directed at you, I was saying that your response was nothing more than a personal attack against me, didn't advance the conversation, and was not scumhunting in any way. You just took it as an opportunity to take a jab at me.

Now, if I was having a conversation with you, and you felt that way about a comment directed at you, that would be an appropriate response. In essence, you said "cry

me

a river", when regardless of whatever you think I was saying, nothing was directed at

you

. If you felt the need to respond, I think explaining your issue with my comment would have been truckloads better than a personal attack. That comment you made is just as much of an appeal to emotion - the comment you made invokes more of a negative feeling against me based on just the comment, and not the offense (where as explaining the offense without the emotionally invoking language would seem less biased).

[Rhinox]

Welcome CF Riot...

Although, I'm sorry to see korts go... I feel like its my fault

anyways, the show must go on.

When I see something so blantantly manipulative

I think I just figured out the problem I have with the case on me (other than because its a case on me ) - namely, the emotional appeals and the "blatant manipulation"...

RC is saying that emotional appeals are blatantly manipulative... but that is only assuming that I'm scum intending to be manipulative. If you don't assume anything about my allignment, is an emotional appeal manipulative? Can you even argue that its scummy at all?

[Rhinox]

Well, since you are on the RC wagon, I don't doubt that that is true.

uh... no, I'm not. Read the vote count.

This whole bit here is why I said what I did in post 211. Rhinox is trying to browbeat us into concluding that if one of them is scum, other can not possibly be.

FFS... NO, I'm NOT. I haven't even voted for RC, and I don't even think he is scum...

What teamwork! Its glorious! Two scum, working in tandem to try to make the fact that I've got them nailed look suspicious.

My meta on you says you're either playing extremely ignorantly, or you're scum. I don't see you as the type of player to have confirmation bias on even 1 player, and you've got it on 2 of us being scum together.

You are just feeding my paranoia about Rhinox being the scum power role here.

Thats the first thing you've said thats correct all game... you're paranoid (or scum)...

It occurs to me that a mafia containing a mafia doctor has added reasons to be paranoid about the presence of an SK.

So after shooting down RC's idea because we don't know if we have a watcher or a doctor, you go ahead and assume that the mafia has a doctor so there must be an sk?


I get the that OGML either hasn't read a majority of my posts, or doesn't care about them, or is diliberately misrepping them just to fit his argument. I know I'm long winded sometimes, but if you're going to insist I'm obvscum, I would at least hope you've read everything I've had to say. IMO, this is basically an acknowledgement that the case is fabricated...

vote: OGML

[Rhinox]

Holy misrepresentation batman! Where did I say there must be an SK? I said its a reason for a scumbag to be worried about the possible presence of an SK.

I wouldn't call it a misrep... you are so stuck on the idea that RC and I are scum partners. You think I'm the one with a power role, so you make up a story that I'm a mafia doc, and RC is worried about an SK because I'm his mafia Doc scum partner, and having a mafia doc is an explanation for why RC is "worried" about an sk... This is nothing but a wild conspiracy theory, based on no facts, that you have to fabricate to justify your argument. In other words, you're playing exactly how I played in our newbie game, when I was scum coming up with crazy scenarios to justify a case to get you mislynched

[Rhinox]

...What?

Seriously. What?

I, in fact, may be misreading this but are you saying OGML is scum because this parallels what you did as scum in a different game?

I think this is a case of reading one line out of my last 3 or so posts out of context and using it to come to a completely incorrect conclusion.

[Rhinox]

No, I've read the others. Believe you me. HOWEVER, that post I quoted is not saying that there is a parallel in how you played as scum in a different game?

I think its scummy for what it is, and it just happens to be a parallel to how I played as scum.

-not-

Thats how I played as scum, so its scummy now.

[Rhinox]

So spy... what do you think of this comment then?

after overanalyzing BC (i decided too since there's not going on right now), i'm going to count the SK discussion against him more than i would initially, because i think i'd do it if i was scum.

I don't seem to remember any melodramatic suprise out of you after pops made this comment...

[Rhinox]

Sorry about the forthcoming wall... but you guys aren't really giving me much of a choice...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But yes, good job comparing scumbolina to you in a maneuver to not... appear... scummy.

It just seems more like you're selectively calling out tells... In your case on pops, I don't recall a point being "its scummy for pops to call bio scummy because of something he (pops) would have did as scum"

Just seems more like you're adding fuel to my plane thats crashing and burning.

I also realized a scum (sk) who was selectively calling out tells in a previous game. Meerkat manor mafia. Linked to it before. CKD said using varients of "to be honest..." was a valid scum tell. Bussed his scum partner with it. Later in the game, a townie used the phrase. CKD completely ignored it, until I pointed it out to him. Just to show that I have a precedent for thinking that selectively calling out tells is suspicious...

If its scummy for what it is, why the qualifier. Thats the issue. Much like RC's whole "self-preservation" move. Why qualify scummy behavior?

It wasn't a qualifier. It was just a nod to OGML, since we have a history. If I'd have left that line out, my point would still be completely valid.

Its like you two want me to want to lynch you, I swear.

I'm tellin' ya... guard jester... woulda been a big hit I think.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I understand now why players flake out and give up - there is literally nothing I can say now that isn't followed by an "ZOMG SCUM!!" (example: this will be quoted as another AtE... )

I'm a

Vanilla Townie, aka Officer Rhinox, a night watchman

. I'm claiming now because there is absolutely no way to defend myself right now. Either you believe me, or you don't. Also, I have unreliable access this weekend and into next week, so I don't want to cause any delays which may or may not interfere with deadline.

I've now seen 2 pretty clear cases laid out against me, by RC and Riot. I feel both are completely 1-sided and biased, completely ignoring everything I had to say in defense of myself, so I'll dedicate the rest of this post responding point by point to the 2 cases as sort of a final word on it. After that, if you guys decide to lynch me, I suggest tomorrow you look very hard at everyone on RC's wagon, (specifically those that switched from me to RC), as well as OGML. Its pretty clear that since I made myself so lynchalicious, scum would keep me around as an easy mislynch for later - maybe even outright defend me (I'm eyeing up bio and Rishi). OGML, I know from meta does not fall into confirmation bias, and when town, argues that simpler explanations are usually more accurate. In this game, the more the discussion goes on, the more outrageous the story becomes to continue to support his pet theory that RC and I are both scum.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Response to RC's case:

"No Random Vote"

Nothing too bad here as the game is just beginning. I just wanted to point out how I wasn't very fond of "I think such-and-such is anti-town, but I'm not going to talk about it".

I later come to Huntress' defense, and still think her position was justified in that breaking from the norm (RV) can indeed provoke an emotional response from other players. A response can easily lead to a great way to begin the game's discussion.

This is nothing but filler. Its a disagreement on game theory, and not an indication of allignment. I think not voting in the random stage hurts the town, or rather, limits the flow of information to the town. Think of how a game would go if nobody decided to random vote, or if nobody voted at all until they were "sure someone is scum". I decided not to make a big post on it at that point in the game because I was trying to prevent myself from going on tangents and making big posts so early in the game, and because similar conversations I've had have not added anything to the game. After being pressured for an explanation, I was happy to talk about it as long as necessary.

"Not Questioning MME as well as huntress"

This rubs me the wrong way too. It doesn't seem genuine.

I think it's more likely that Rhinox simply forgot about MME, he didn't notice him because he didn't write the same thing that Huntress wrote.

Again, nothing major, it just feels fake to me.

I've explained that I felt MME was just confirming at that point. Maybe he didn't know the game started, or maybe he didn't have time to do anything but confirm. My PM said to confirm in thread, so I came to the thread and quickly scrolled down to the quickreply box to just /confirm, until I realized other players were saying stuff other than confirming. Huntress, on the other hand, made a conscious decision to not vote.

Saying that "This feels fake" accomplishes nothing more than adding filler to my case...

Going back to earlier. Maybe Rhinox sincerely feels this way, but to me it sounds like he's going to great lengths to basically justify calling Huntress out for not voting.

Again, nothing but filler. I've pointed you to games where I've called out players for not random voting before. I'd say that pretty much means I'm sincere about it.

"Discussing the SK"

I don't see how this should be a point against me at all... The core of my argument has always been, "No town players decision should be effected D1 by assuming anything about factions". RC argues that decisions would change if we assume there is an sk, but I have still never seen a reason why. Is there anything scummy about my statement?

Extending on this, this is also partly why I'm suspicious of OGML (and now CF Riot as well)... they are assuming faction information to support a theory that says I'm scum. They are completely false assumptions. Its also circular logic. "I'm scum, so I must be a separate faction from RC. If I'm part of a separate faction, I'm scum..."

"Pairing up"

This is when I start to think Rhinox is bad news instead of just someone I have an honest disagreement with.

Nowhere in post 82 is pops defending me. In fact, contrarily, he says he's already getting a slight scum vibe off of me. pops makes it clear that he understands the point I was making, and that's about all I can get from it.

Moreover, pops was only addressing me to begin with because Rhinox asked him to. Is he setting pops up for certain circumstances?

I've already explained that it was an honest mistake where I forgot that I asked pops about you. Is that something scum would do more than town? If I'm scum, did I just think that 8 or 9 town players just would't have noticed that I specifically asked pops about you? Does this sound like something scum would intentionally do, knowing they would probably get called out for it?

That being said, when I realized my mistake, I dropped it. There is or never was any pairing up. I find it overdefensive to assume that me thinking pops was defending you means that I was trying to announce a scum pair - there are many reasons for a player to defend another player. It was like page 2, it seemed like something good to talk about.

I tell him in post 152 that his appeal isn't good enough for me. Essentially, I'm not writing this off as a simple mistake. Not only does Rhinox end up using this mistake to his advantage (discussed below) but his quick punishment of pops for "defending me" sounds completely artifical. The fact that he suggests pops

may be

attempting to distance himself from me by calling my position "slightly scummy" seems almost entirely founded in creating something out of nothing.

Key words: MAY BE. They carry the obvious implication: MAY NOT BE. Again, it was like page 2 or 3, and seemed like a nice conversation starter. At the time, my inconsistency was the fatal point, and prevented any good conversation from coming out of it. Saying I was trying to pair pops and RC is nothing more than looking back, after the fact, trying to post-rationalize it into something its not in an attempt to tie off every loose string to "prove" that I'm scum.

"Suspicious vs. Scummy"

Seriously? This is actually a point against me? wtf everyone... I have my definitions of suspicious vs. scummy: namely, suspicious = potentially scummy. I also use suspicious to mean, "I'm suspicious of everyone who's not confirmed town, no matter how pro-town they seem". What is possibly scummy about this? I really think this is just piling crap on top of other crap, in a quantity over quality sort of manner - basically, everything thrown at me so far has to be so construed and distorted to indicate that I'm scum - but because theres like 10,000 of these points, at least 1 of them must be true... and thats just a complete fallacy.

"WIFOM"

I feel like everything RC said in this block was completely slanted and manipulated... It reminds me a lot of the "ORLY Scum?" fallacy.

To boil down the entirely block into facts and not a creative writing short story, this is basically my entire use of WIFOM:

I'm asking the town to consider whether making a mistake/inconsistancy like I did is something that town are more likely to do, scum are more likely to do, or either can do equally.

Instead of actually answering the question and giving reasons, everybody just jumps to the conclusion of "ZOMG you're using

WIFOM

. You must be scum just trying to get us to ignore the point because town are just as likely to be inconsistent." The problem with this is, the obvious point is being overlooked: town is actually just as likely to be inconsistent, if not more likely. But, it makes me scum to point that out?

The reason my explanation posts about my inconsistancies were so emotional and extra wifomy is because I guess I put more weight onto my initial error than the rest of the town... If I would have seen that inconsistency made by another player, I'd have jumped all over it. I would have viewed it as a fatal mistake. So I was frantically and desparately trying to explain how it was just an honest mistake. I'm starting to get the feeling that the reason I'm being voted/suspected now has little if anything to do with the actual inconsistency I had, and more to do with me frantically trying to explain it. Thats discouraging, because basically thats saying that just the act of defending myself, and being honest, is actually making me look scummier. I'm starting to think it would have been better to lie and make up a BS excuse about it, or just try to forget it ever happened, than to actually give an honest explanation. So much for the idea that townies should never lie.

bionic refers to a meta game in which Rhinox and himself were both a part of. He implies that the mafia was actively using WIFOM to defend themselves, and asks why Rhinox appears to be blantantly using WIFOM here if that's the case.

Rhinox response was that the game wasn't "fresh in his head", despite it being his most recently completed game.

Refer to my last post for a response to this point.

Putting this statement under WIFOM for a specific reason. The point he's trying to make is that by not lynching him he will be able to prove he is town.

It's an appeal, it's as if he wants us to believe that if he were scum, he would not be able to create a "mountain of overwhelming townie play", but because he is town, he needs to be kept alive to do it.

Call it circular reasoning, call it WIFOM, call it an appeal... I'll just call it bad news.

No. Actually, I was saying that it was too early in the game to have a mountain of pro-town play, considering that my play up to that point had been poor. If I wouldn't be lynched, then that would be a chance to turn my game around and be pro-town. Thats not to say that only a town player can be pro-town, nor is that saying that it would "prove" that I'm town.

If you really thought I was scum at that point, but maybe having a little bit of a doubt, maybe it would have even been a good strategy to hope that I would be so worried about self-preservation that I would be so anxious to bus my scum partners to look pro-town, that I would actually lead the town to the rest of the scum.

And by the way, the last sentence of the quote above is a prime example of the manipulative spin all throughout RC's case on me - just a trick to make something sound a lot worse than it really is.

Ugh. It's like he says understands why his statement is scummy, but asks if it counts anyways (because Rhinox's statements are too scummy to be used by scum).

No, thats not what I said at all. What I said, in a melodramatic sarcastic way, is that nothing I could say would help me. And thats been proven to be true 100%. Nothing I have said has helped me, and everything I've said has just been digging a bigger hole. So it is true, and my statement does count.

"Passive-Aggression/Defeatism - Emotional Manipulation"

I have a personal tell that I look for. I say personal because I'm not sure if it is widely-recognized or not.

I don't like it when people get pessimistic.

To me, townies should always have some sort of zeal, some sort of indignation in their hearts when they are being voted or fear they are going to be lynched.

Granted, not everyone has the same sort of personality, but I will accept a townie getting supremely frustrated with their fellow players before I will accept a townie beating themselves up, even in jest, over being voted.

If you agree with that, then this statement would likely stand out to you as well.

I have not been pessimistic, I have not given up, and I have not beat myself up over being voted. I have beaten myself over making a stupid mistake, and any AtE I'm being accused of have been my honest feelings.

But as I said before, I can't really respond to any AtE without it sounding like another AtE, so I'll just leave it for what it is. As this is the only thing I don't really have an answer for, then I guess I can't really complain if you guys lynch me for excessive use of AtE. I think the rest of the stuff is twisted and distorted crap post rationalized to explain how every single post I've made somehow supports me being scum.

What I will say, as I've been saying all along, is... when I'm eventually revealed as town, then either I haven't been using AtE, or AtE isn't a valid scumtell. I guess I shouldn't be too worried about it though... This game should really help out my meta whenever I'm in a game where I'm

actually

scum... :shrug:

See my previous posts for an explanation about the "Cry me a River" Comment.

"Missing some pieces"

Moar filler please... Just more crap piled on in hopes to overwhelm with quantity.

Anyways, its pretty much par for the course for how I've been playing this game... I "forgot" Korts explanation because we each happened to be in 2 games together at the same time, and I got confused over what comments were made in which games.

"Summary"

Summary:

∙ Potential cover-up for his ignorance of MME, unnecessarily frustrated with Huntress and unwillingness to explain why

*I don't see this as a point, but I do see you spinning this in a way that makes it sound worse than it really was. I wasn't ignorant of MME, my frustration with huntress wasn't unnecessary (strange accusation coming from someone who's position has been that no conversation is useless), and I did explain myself.

∙ Potentially dragging out the SK argument longer than necessary, blowing parts out of proportion in order to detract from tells he has been exhibiting

*This point is a complete fabrication, and a stretch to come to this conclusion from our sk conversation. You're just as guilty as dragging out the argument longer than necessary as I am, and again, this is a very strange accusation coming from someone who doesn't think any conversation is useless or unnecessary. I dind't blow anything out of proportion, and nothing was meant as a distaction. The whole argument boils down to me asking you how the town should play differently if we assume there is an sk, and you skating around the answer, never giving a clear response.

∙ Intentionally misrepresenting the relationship between pops and myself based on circumstances he created

*So you're basically saying that I intentionally contradicted myself to try to get you and pops both lynched as scum partners, just hoping that nobody would notice my contradiction. I hope people realize how rediculous this accusation actually is...

∙ Retracting said misrepresentation noth with the motivation of clarification but rather with the continual motive of self-preservation

*motive of self-preservation... this is a new one. The retraction and subsequent defenses were honest. I've pretty much given all the ways I could have defended or explained my contradiction... I chose the "be straightforward and honest" approach. Is there any other way I could have clarified my action in a way that would have been honest, believeable, and not seemed like only self-preservation? If so, please tell...

∙ The flagrant, admitted use of WIFOM in order to make defensive statements

*I think I explained this well enough above

∙ A conspicuously close relationship with bionic that seems to produce little in the way of hunting.

*great... link me to someone else while you're at it. I must be playing really bad if I've given away my entire scum team on D1 (that was sarcasm, btw). Seriously, this point seems pulled out of thin air, as its the first time its been mentioned. But whatever you can do to continue to overwhelm with quantity, right?

∙ The flagrant, admitted use of appeals to manipulate other players in instances that are primarily preemptive but also in response specifically to those who show suspicion of him.

*As I've said, its only manipulative if I'm actually scum, making this circular reasoning. Unless you're trying to say that I'm being a manipulative townie. And I'm going to continue to pound this point home. When I'm eventually revealed as town, everyone will either have to admit that I wasn't using AtE, or that AtE aren't always reliable scum tells.

∙ Forgetting two important happenings in the game that have caused him to apologize for not properly reading/recalling the game (e.g. asking pops a question/Korts' activity)

*Right. Here's the point that I should be considered most suspicious for, but its kinda being thrown on as an afterthought. The actual act that sparked the entire D1 conversation isn't even a major point against me. Thats probably the most frustrating part.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Response to CF's presentation of the case:

This is a huge stretch, and AtE which Rhinox is guilty of throughout the day.

That was not a stretch at all. RC admitted he was talking about the sk to warn the town to take an sk into consideration when making night choices. The implication is that RC didn't think the town was smart enough to take into consideration all roles without someone telling them. The only emotion I was expressing was my own suprise in that being RC's reasoning for talking about the sk. And RC still never said how any town player should play differently, assuming there is an sk, on D1.

Of all the rolefishing accusations thrown at RC, I think this one by Rhinox stands out worse than any of them. He's blatantly asking for speculation on specific town power roles, and I see it as instigating on top of that.

Not role fishing at all... we have a list of all town roles in the game. I think if RC is so confident that assuming there is an sk will make any difference in how any one of those roles play D1, he should be able to go down that list and explain how at least 1 decision would be different than not assuming anything about factions.

I also ask you what your definition of role fishing is? The way I understand it, role fishing is trying to get information to slip out about a particular players role - clearly not what I'm asking. You might say this is role speculating, but as we already know every possible role in the game, there is nothing left to speculate about. Did you not realize the semi-openness of the game because you were just so anxious to jump on my wagon? At worst, its role theory speculating - i.e. A player is

role A

. That player can either assume there is an sk, or assume nothing about scum factions. Will that player's actions change at all as a result of either assumption? I believe the answer is no, and I believe RC has not effectively answered that question, despite his insistance to the contrary.

This is not only AtE, but it's calling out anyone who votes for him after this point, and is setting up for future lynches if he can shift the wagon from him today when he doesn't even know who will vote him yet.

Wow... I must be magical. I'm trying to shift a wagon off myself that doesn't even exist. Or didn't you realize that the wagon has been on RC much more than me so far.

This line is mega-BS. I assumed RC just forgot he was voting Rhinox when I read the post in question. But are you really trying to say he's scum slipping up because he's not paying attention, after the entire Pops fiasco where you claimed VI and said, "Scum wouldn't make such an obvious slip would they?" It's almost the exact same thing Rhinox did himself, except Rhinox admits to it while RC's looks like a simple mistake.

wtf... so just because I made a simple mistake, I lose the right to call anybody out the rest of the game for something that may or may not be a simple mistake?

Also, what bullshit is it that my simple mistake is viewed as anything but, but RC's simple mistake was automatically assumed to just be an honest mistake...

177 is a stretch that looks like fishing for a reason to press Korts, which is kind of minor. But it's also a misrep of Korts's stance on Pops, as pops was continuously posting fluff to hide non-contributing, while Korts's post was obviously a check-in until he made a real post.

I'm sure there will be something wrong with this explanation as well, but whatever... I feel a common fault of townies under pressure is that they become 100% defensive, and stop making cases. Then, right before they're lynched, someone throws on top "you haven't even been scum hunting all game, you've only been focused on not getting yourself lynched" as sort of a nail in the coffin. Its understandable thought... its hard to get a word out when you're getting screamed at from every direction. Despite being under enormous suspicion, I was at least trying to continue scumhunting, but even that turned out to be total phail due to an oversight on my part.

Rhinox has also been strongly pushing the RC wagon along, (see everything above) and yet he's doing so from the sidelines by holding his vote. He's devoting all his posts to attacking RC, and he hasn't called anyone else scummy, but he's not voting. Why? So he can shuck the responsibility for it when RC flips town. In 207 he calls out the entire RC wagon. Not those who hopped on, or those who look suspicious, the whole wagon. This is setting up a D2 vote if RC gets lynched and shielding from getting votes on D2 by having something to point at and say he was "against" the RC lynch.

Another case of spinning everything into a way that supports a theory... I haven't been pushing the RC wagon at all. We have been having a conversation. Maybe you've been a part of too many D1 1 on 1 assaults to realize that two players can disagree about something without tunneling in on each other. Maybe you'll also notice how I spoke up against the RC wagon after it quickly grew to L-1. I stand by my point that its extremely peculiar for everyone to say I'm so obvscum, yet use my logic and arguments to justify wagoning RC.

if I'm really scum, why would I speak out against the RC wagon, knowing that the obvious place for suspicion to turn back to would be right back at me? It wouldn't be a case of a scum (me) trying to look good by defending a townie (RC), it would be more like a case of a scum committing suicide by derailing a townie wagon knowing that I would be the next choice. Also, when RC was at L-1, I could have hammered. Of course, that means I would have probably been lynched tomorrow, but it would have prevented me from being lynched today, and would have given my scum partners a great opportunity to bus me tomorrow and ensure they all make it to D3 without any connections to me, as well as limiting the D2 conversation to how obvscum I was for hammering + all of D1.

^^ struck for sarcasm purposes... its wifom, so I better not say it. Even if it makes complete sense.

Backtracking. Obviously I might add. 254 is his first real vote in god knows how many pages, and it looks solidly like OMGUS to me.

Translation: lets throw out a couple more buzzword accusations... see how much bigger the pile of crap can get. Its not backtracking, obviously. Since you didn't explain why it is, I don't have to explain why its not. Also, its not OMGUS - I gave reasons for my vote. Asked asked questions, and waited for answers. If everyone wasn't allowed to ever vote for someone who was voting for them (and if thats always OMGUS, and if that always means the person doing it is scum), then all scum would ever have to do to ensure that they win is just vote a townie first. I believe it was OGML actually who taught me that little nugget of information.

For a vote to be OMGUS, it requires a lack of other explanation or reasons, which my vote did not lack. So no, sorry, not OGMLUS.
--------------------
Guys if every vote by a player for a player already voting him were automatically OMGUS, then all the scum would have to do to win is vote a townie first.

I agree with this, and it's another example of Rhinox squirming around with different explanations for scummy actions. (This is out of place, but I had it noted under IAUN instead of Rhinox for some reason, and I don't remember where it goes.)

This is complete BS... Does anyone even remember what sparked this lttle side rant? Rishi made a case about bio, and I said I didn't find bio scummy. Rishi asked me why I didn't find bio suspicious - which started this whole thing about suspicious vs. scummy...

So how bout instead of calling me scum for not agreeing with my definitions of words, somebody goes back and tell me how I'm scum for not agreeing with Rishi and thinking Bio was scummy. That might actually be something legitimate to add, instead of all this crap slinging that seems like nothing more than an attempt to overwhelm me into digging myself a bigger hole, or just giving up.

In conclusion ... I can't fathom how RC has more votes than [Rhinox].

WE AGREE! Only when I speak concerns about the RC wagon, I'm obvscum pushing the wagon from the sidelines, and when you do it its not?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Premptive EBWOP for jah's cross post: Just acknowledging that I read it, and I think I've covered all the points in this post.

[Rhinox]

V/LA for the next couple of days. Just found out somebody I knew was on the plane that crashed near Buffalo.

oh wow...

I'm truely sorry to hear that..

[Rhinox]

*works.

not a freudian slip i swear. Actually it possibly is for a different game...

haha... a little too self aware, eh?

also, note to everyone: I will have internet this weekend. yay!

[Rhinox]

This is just straight, gut fueled opinion talking here, but I really think it would be a mistake to lynch RC over Rhinox today.

I know it would be a mistake to lynch me at all. To a lesser extent, I'm not sure RC would be a good lynch either, but from my point of view, he would be a better lynch than me.

I've already explained that it was an honest mistake where I forgot that I asked pops about you. Is that something scum would do more than town? If I'm scum, did I just think that 8 or 9 town players just would't have noticed that I specifically asked pops about you? Does this sound like something scum would intentionally do, knowing they would probably get called out for it?

That being said, when I realized my mistake, I dropped it. There is or never was any pairing up. I find it overdefensive to assume that me thinking pops was defending you means that I was trying to announce a scum pair - there are many reasons for a player to defend another player. It was like page 2, it seemed like something good to talk about.

Can you explain how that relates to this quote:

This sounds like fence-sitting, and a bad attempt at distancing.

And how that isn't trying to announce a scum pair?

As I've already said, it was very early in the game. I was looking for something to talk about. It seemed like a good starting point for a discussion. Yes, I was speculating that it could point to them being a scum pair, but it wasn't anything more than pure speculation meant as a springboard for a discussion. When I realized my mistake - that I actually provoked the comments from pops - I dropped it. I realized it wasn't a valid point, and I wouldn't get the type of discussion out of it I was hoping for.

The thing is, you were originally saying that town power roles wouldn't act any different by assuming there is an SK, not that they shouldn't. Originally you were just arguing that Coyote's SK discussion was pointless because no one would act any different even if they did assume that there is an SK. Now you're arguing that it's actively scummy on his part because they will act differently if influenced by his suggestion. You can't have it both ways.

Actually, I was saying that I couldn't see any reason for any town role to act differently for assuming anything about the scum factions on day 1, so I felt it was scummy for RC to insist that they should, especially since I've never heard a reason why (RC, please point me to the post where you answered for how any town role should act differently today for assuming there is an sk). So I don't really see what point you're trying to make. I don't see how i'm trying to have anything both ways.

[Rhinox]

If I am lynched, what will happen to Rhinox when I flip town?

Why should your allignment determine my fate? Also, isn't this the same type of comment that I got chewed up for earlier?

Frankly I'm more partial to OGML's original idea that Rhinox was attempting to lead a wagon indirectly. On the one hand, saying that I am innocent and the wrong lynch, but on the other

throwing every damaging accusation he could at me

(e.g. stating the obvious, aiding mafia through SK-talk, not answering his questions, being overly defensive, partnering up to pops, etc). Of course, where I differ with OGML is his further prediction that we are two separate scum parties.

They're only damaging if they're true. Since those are pretty much the reasons you are being wagoned, that means that either there is good merit in those accusations, or scum are taking those accusations and running with them just to get you lynched. I haven't voted for you, and I don't think you're scum, because I find it impossible to be objective when I'm involved in a 1 vs 1 argument. I don't believe that I have been pushing your wagon from the sideline - and I'm pretty sure that I expressed my concerns about your wagon before anybody even brought up that accusation.

Even if you think I'm scum pushing your wagon from the sideline (which is nothing more than a guess based on nothing really, to rationalize how I could be scum), that would still mean there would have to be scum on your wagon if you end up being lynched - unless you think I'm so skilled that I can appear to be really scummy, all while getting every town player to vote you so every scum can not be on your wagon. Assuming 4 scum in the game (which I always do in a mini, FYI) if you are town and lynched, unless every other town player was mislynching you, there would have to be scum on your wagon. Since I know I'm town, and I'm not voting for you, that would pretty much prove to me that at least 1 scum would have to be on your wagon to get you lynched today if you're town.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spy: what assumptions did you make to come up with the conclusion that at least 1 of Rishi, pops, and huntress have to be scum? I'm not saying I disagree with your method - I use similar process of elimination methods to focus my scum hunting later in the game when more information is available to the town - however even after explaining why you don't think me or RC is scum, I still can't get to being 100% sure that at least 1 of the 3 has to be scum.

In order to come to that conclusion, you would have to be 100% sure that at least 4 of Bio, Username, CFR, OGML, jahudo and moriarty are town, as well as assuming you are town yourself, and assuming 4 scum in the game. I find it suspicious that you are able to confirm 4 town players on D1, and use that information to say that the probability is 100% that at least 1 of Rishi, pops, and huntress are scum. I do agree with the points you've brought up against the three players, but I feel like its manipulative for you to say that you're 100% sure that at least 1 of them is scum.

[Rhinox]

AtE is not part of Rhinox's meta.

Well OGML, conspiracy and confirmation bias is not part of your meta as town, and yet shows up here in your insistance that both RC and I are scum.

Spy/Moriarty - If Rhinox is scum, how does this change your opinion of pops? And the same question, only with RC as scum.

OGML, I asked a similar question to you earlier that you never answered, and I got chastised for even asking it. When I show up as town after being lynched, how will that change your opinion of RC and the rest of the players in the game.

Will respond to other points later, but did I miss something? Why are we assuming four scum in the game? In a setup like this, three is normal. We get four scum if there's three scum plus a serial killer or two scumgroups of two. But how can someone know that if not a member of one of the groups?

Assuming 4 scum in the game (which I always do in a mini, FYI)

I always assume 4 scum in a mini, until proven otherwise. I don't assume anything about factions.

and for the record, here's the full context where you took that quote from:

In order to come to that conclusion, you would have to be 100% sure that at least

4

3 of Bio, Username, CFR, OGML, jahudo and moriarty are town, as well as assuming you are town yourself, and assuming 4 scum in the game. I find it suspicious that you are able to confirm

4

3 town players on D1, and use that information to say that the probability is 100% that at least 1 of Rishi, pops, and huntress are scum. I do agree with the points you've brought up against the three players, but I feel like its manipulative for you to say that you're 100% sure that at least 1 of them is scum.

I changed the 4's to 3's above because I realized my numbers were off. Changing the assumption from 4 scum to 3 scum only makes Spy's claim worse, because he has to be able to confirm 1 more townie, for a total of now 4 instead of 3. In other words, I was just expressing a best case scenario for Spy's claim that at least 1 of Rishi, Pops, or huntress has to scum, by showing that he would have to be 100% confident of at least 3 players being town if there are the maximum 4 scum in the game. If there are only 3 scum, then he would have to be 100% confident on 4 players being town, making his accusation even harder to believe.

[Rhinox]

@ Spy: I get what your saying... basically, the 100% chance you said, is based on your own read of the game. But when I see someone quote a % chance, I automatically think that is a set statistical probability that is independant of anyone's read. For example, in a 3 scum game, the true statistical probability of 1 of Rishi, Pops, or Huntress being scum is ~62%. In a 4 scum game, the probability rises to ~75%. (both numbers assuming you're calling yourself 100% confirmed town). So thats why I feel your 100% is misleading - there is a big difference between saying you strongly believe 1 of those 3 to be scum, and saying there is a 100% chance one of them is scum, IMO.

[Rhinox]

Rishi 345:

First of all, if a question or comment is directed at another player, I would appreciate it if you would let that player answer before stepping in. This isn't the first time you've done this in the game, either. You have a strong possibility of tainting the answer that the player is about to give.

2 things: 1) I DID give an answer before bio posted, and 2) After I gave my first answer, I was about to post almost verbatim the same thing bio posted after me, but as bio already posted, I decided not to even bother since the town would have no way in knowing whether or not I was actually influenced by bio's answer. While you're saying you're upset with bio because it would taint my answer, I'm a little upset that I wasn't able to give a defense that the town would know was 100% from my mind and not influenced by what someone else said.

I didn't think we had come to any conclusion on the number of scum issue, and Rhinox was talking as if it were a certainty there. Also, it could definitely be a slip. If someone only has one scumbuddy, then it's a good possibility that there's another scumgroup out there with also two members.

Thats not true either... If you'd like, I'll link you to the game where I was sk, and the other scum faction was a scum group of 2, for a total of 3 scum in the game. I think thats the first game bio and I were in together.

Good job explaining why you wrote four instead of three in a few different ways. Nice job appending the line "which I always do in a mini, FYI" to your original quote. The fact that you felt the need to explain it so many ways makes me feel as though you're getting defensive about something. Still, your explanation is plausible (and bionnicchop2 derailed my question anyway), so I won't vote but, unlike before, IGMEOY now.

The 4 instead of 3 was in regards to the number of players Spy would have to confirm as town, and not the number of scum. I also didn't append anything to my original quote. It was there all along. You just overlooked it.

If I am lynched, what will happen to Rhinox when I flip town?

Why should your allignment determine my fate? Also, isn't this the same type of comment that I got chewed up for earlier?

Frankly I'm more partial to OGML's original idea that Rhinox was attempting to lead a wagon indirectly. On the one hand, saying that I am innocent and the wrong lynch, but on the other

throwing every damaging accusation he could at me

(e.g. stating the obvious, aiding mafia through SK-talk, not answering his questions, being overly defensive, partnering up to pops, etc). Of course, where I differ with OGML is his further prediction that we are two separate scum parties.

They're only damaging if they're true. Since those are pretty much the reasons you are being wagoned, that means that either there is good merit in those accusations, or scum are taking those accusations and running with them just to get you lynched. I haven't voted for you, and I don't think you're scum, because I find it impossible to be objective when I'm involved in a 1 vs 1 argument. I don't believe that I have been pushing your wagon from the sideline - and I'm pretty sure that I expressed my concerns about your wagon before anybody even brought up that accusation.

Even if you think I'm scum pushing your wagon from the sideline (which is nothing more than a guess based on nothing really, to rationalize how I could be scum), that would still mean there would have to be scum on your wagon if you end up being lynched - unless you think I'm so skilled that I can appear to be really scummy, all while getting every town player to vote you so every scum can not be on your wagon.

Assuming 4 scum in the game (which I always do in a mini, FYI)

if you are town and lynched, unless every other town player was mislynching you, there would have to be scum on your wagon. Since I know I'm town, and I'm not voting for you, that would pretty much prove to me that at least 1 scum would have to be on your wagon to get you lynched today if you're town.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spy: what assumptions did you make to come up with the conclusion that at least 1 of Rishi, pops, and huntress have to be scum? I'm not saying I disagree with your method - I use similar process of elimination methods to focus my scum hunting later in the game when more information is available to the town - however even after explaining why you don't think me or RC is scum, I still can't get to being 100% sure that at least 1 of the 3 has to be scum.

In order to come to that conclusion, you would have to be 100% sure that at least 4 of Bio, Username, CFR, OGML, jahudo and moriarty are town, as well as assuming you are town yourself,

and assuming 4 scum in the game.

I find it suspicious that you are able to confirm 4 town players on D1, and use that information to say that the probability is 100% that at least 1 of Rishi, pops, and huntress are scum. I do agree with the points you've brought up against the three players, but I feel like its manipulative for you to say that you're 100% sure that at least 1 of them is scum.

^^^ You selectively quoted from the second bolded part, and either ignored or overlooked the first bolded part.

Why is everyone just assuming that SpyreX's list is correct? To me, the list seemed somewhat arbitrary, but it seems like everyone has bought the mantra that one of us on that list is definitely scum.

Not everyone... but since I've spoken out against Spy's list, that automatically means I'm protecting a scum partner

Moriarty 343:

Plausible? Well, it's hard to say. Overwhelmingly likely today will end in either a lynch of Rhinox or you. A wagon jump at the last minute to pops is possible though, especialy if he continues to be as unhelpful as he is right now.

I'm not sure I like this sentiment at all. You're not the only one who's expressed this. What I don't like is, your vote is on pops, yet you say you expect either myself or RC will be lynched. What exactly, then, is your vote on pops acomplishing? I would think if you really thought pops was scum, you would be more adamant in your position, and not accept a defacto "Rhinox or RC will be lynched" - which just makes any of the talk thats not about me or RC today basically just for show.

Moriarty 341:

Also, something I'd like to ask Rhinox: you claim that the wagons on both you and RC had a significant amount of scum on them, so who do you think the scum might be? It's strange for you to make such a claim (which I thought notable as well) and then not do any wagon analysis of your own whatsoever later.

Then you haven't been paying too close attention to my posts. I'm currently voting OGML, who is on my wagon. I've given reasons for this as well. I feel OGML has been playing like he's in confirmation bias - but my town meta on OGML says he doesn't get confirmation bias as town. OGML also has been coming up with some pretty extravagant scenarios based on pure speculation to "justify" how his conspiracy theory is 100% correct. Again, my town meta on OGML says that OGML avoids the use of complicated situations to explain theories and focuses more on facts and simple, obvious explanations.

I also did look at the RC wagon a little more closely (I touched on it in my 42nd post), but before I can come to any concrete conclusions, I have to know RC's allignment. If RC ends up being scum, that would pretty much change my entire view of his wagon.

RC 340:

Arguments so based in emotion are used to cloud the rational judgment of another person.

Let me go at this from a different direction... would a town player be manipulative, or try to "cloud the rational judgment of another person."?

Unfortunately because of schedule difficulties, I usually post at a different time than most players, so, as some of you have probably noticed, I tend to average about a post a day in the wee hours of the morning. Why this is important is because I think it puts me at a disadvantage having people think that I am rehashing old discussions, when in reality I usually look at the thread with an entire page of activity that I haven't seen before.

^^^ ZOMG APPEAL TO EMOTIONZZZ!!!

Seriously though, is this not an appeal to emotion? is this not meant to manipulate us into feeling sorry for you for being on a different posting schedule? Is this not meant to make us give you a little extra room since you are so inherantly at a disagvantage because of where you live?

And which side are you on?

Let me rephrase your statement so that you can better understand the corner you painted yourself in. Either you acknowledge to helping scum bandwagon me, or your "merited accusations" against me are still not good enough for your own vote against me.

How bout you don't rephrase and misrep my statements in an attempt to make me appear to painted into a corner when I'm not.

I think I've been pretty clear that the points of concern I've expressed over you are not strong enough to make me vote for you. I've also said that my judgement of you is clouded due to the fact that its impossible for me to be objective about you right now since we had such a heated exchange earlier on, and you're arguing for my lynch now. Personally, I would love to see you lynched - but I'm not sure it would be for appropriate reasons (read: I'm not sure I would be voting to lynch scum). So, its possible that scum are taking the accusations I've made and running with them to lynch you. How does that make me supportive of your wagon, when I've openly admitted that I don't feel your scummy, or that my concerns of you are worthy of my own vote? The other possibility is that I'm not giving my concerns of you enough credit, and that there is actually merit in them, and the rest of the town sees the merit in them and are voting you, where I'm discounting my concerns because were I to vote you, I feel it would be because I personally wanted to see you hang, and not because I thought you were scum.

In other words, because I can't analyze you objectively, I would rather spend my time trying to find scum elsewhere, rather than propetuate the "either RC or Rhinox will be lynched" sentiment.

OGML isn't the most townie player here, but so far as I can tell your case against him is based largely on his overzealous predictions.

Why is OGML a better lynch than me?

haha.. nice try, but I'm not biting. Instead, I'll throw it right back at you: Why do you think I should consider you over OGML? Did you just admit to being scum? Did you just admit that you think you are scummier than OGML?

I do indeed think there are; I think pops sticks out like a sore thumb.

Then why are your posts 90% focused on me, and very little focused on pops? I know... because you don't think you can convince the town to vote for pops, and you think that getting me lynched is the only way to prevent your own lynch...

Then why are you voting OGML?

I've explained this already. I think what you're really asking is, why am I not considering players on your wagon? Well, because if scum are pushing for your mislynch, the key factor in coming to that conclusing is concrete knowledge that you are actually town. Sure, I've said I'm not sure your scum, but that doesn't mean I think you're town either.

pops 330:

The second part is admittedly confusing. What i was addressing there is Rhinox's premature roleclaim. With a vanilla claim, you usually want to lynch the guy who made the claim, since if he's town it makes it easier for scum to shoot at power roles, if he's not town then duh he needs to be lynched. Not saying lynching a vanilla is better than lynching town, but lynching claimed-vanilla is definitely better than lynching a townie player with no claim out, it helps the town in night strategy. So i asked in that post whether maybe the jailkeeper has any sort of positive synergy with vanilla townies that would justify leaving Rhinox alive..

My roleclaim was for a combination of 3 reasons: 1) I wasn't sure how close to deadline we were getting, 2) My internet service was looking to be unreliable and possibly disappear, and 3) there is no way to defend against my main offense (AtE) without using more AtE.

I was also using it as a strategy that would hopefully reveal some scum. I thought any scum who were currently pushing for my lynch would relax and look elsewhere to try to lynch/reveal the power roles. I'm haven't been able to come to any conclusions because nobody changed their vote as a result of my claim, either for me, or away from me.

Rhinox is a tough case to call. Admittedly, all he's done is massive amounts of low level transgressions. We haven't caught him using deliberate logical fallacies, or chainsaw defending, or anything really scummy like that. Just WIFOM in AtE, one of the things that blend in the most with newbies. I think bionicchop is coming from the perspective of wanting to separate newbie from scum in that respect, but i think he's probably erring on the wrong side in this case.

I don't think I would consider myself a newbie anymore. I think its wrong to say my actions are indicative of either newbie, or scum. I think another viable option is that I'm just having a bad game. The problem with claiming to be having a bad game is that if I were scum, I would always make that claim. I would never admit to being scum. The counter argument I would propose is, what other argument, if not that I'm just having a bad game, would I say as town?

Spy 328:

1.) Of COURSE it is my read of the game. The only scenario where I could be 100% sure day 1 that one of them was scum is... if I was scum and bussing my partner in that mess. In that case, I would have expected a response from you to address that instead of saying I'm misconstruing.

Well this is what I'm trying to work out, without being completely direct about it.

2.) True statistical probability would mean I could have picked any three names. I didn't.

I actually had that in my last post, but took it out because I'm trying to keep my posts shorter and more concise.

Those names were picked specifically because...with their play I can not see all three of them being town. Hence, one MUST be scum. Hence, 100%

This is why its misleading... when you say 100%, that means that if we lynch all 3 of them in a row, we will hit at least 1 scum. If we lynch all 3 of them and they're all town, then obviously the chance of 1 of them being scum is not 100% right now. You can think very strongly that 1 of those 3 is scum, but you can't be 100% sure right now. if you still say you are, then I would refer you back up to your point 1) and start wondering why you are absolutely confident, without leaving any room to be wrong.

OGML 325:

I'd be willing to wager that the rhinox scum partner in that grouping is pops.

*sigh*... I don't have any scum partners...

But I'll play your little game... how do I know you're not RC's scum partner, since you're voting for me and not him, when he's the top wagon? Looks like an attempt to save your partner by being on and pushing for the alternate wagon. For that matter, you and CFR seem to be on exactly the same page. He must be your scum partner too. Look, I've found the scum team: OGML, RC, and CFR!

Except I know how silly it is to make those types of accusations without knowing anyones allignment.

CFR 324:

I very strongly disagree.

Will it help if I rephrase my statement without the sarcasm and yes, instigation?

I find it odd that RC would claim that the reason he kept talking about the possible presence of an SK was to warn the town to be prepared. That implies that the town is unableto read the mod's list of possible roles and interpret what that means. RC also claims that town power roles should take into account the sk when making night choices tonight. I'm still waiting for rc to give me the post number where he explained how.

What this tells me is that maybe RC is used to playing in towns that are full of newbs, and there is a need for someone to point everything out. Maybe it shows that RC is arrogant, and feels he is the sole authority on all things pro-town, and always thinks the rest of the town is ignorant. Maybe it says RC realized the town sentiment towards the SK discussion was that it wasn't helpful, so this was the best BS reason he could come up with to justify the conversation, or maybe RC is scum who was just trying to appear pro-town by warning the town to be careful about the sk, when it is obvious that the town is able to deduce on their own that there might be an sk.

I think the above paragraph is a better representation of what I was trying to say.

And while I agree with you on that, I think you asking RC what "PlayerA as RoleA" should do is rolefishing.

No, its not. For 2 reasons. 1, I don't see how any answer RC would give me would help me determine anyones role, and 2, I believe the answer is there is no difference in how any role would play when hunting scum in general on D1, vs assuming there is an sk. In other words, I'm not expecting an answer, and the lack of an answer proves my point.

At the time the statement in question was made, you were the leading wagon with 4 votes.

Ok, fine, but I still don't see your point at all... If I'm "calling out anyone for voting me and using that to justify voting for anybody down the road", which I'm pretty sure thats not what I was doing, then you're basically saying that I can OGMUS my way into getting the town to lynch whoever I want, just because someone voted for me? Do you really think that the town would go for that?

What I was doing, and I don't think there is anything wrong with this, is asking the town to slow down and think about the decision a little, instead of the shoot first ask questions later mentallity that seems to be growing. We have a set deadline, and the thread is active - no sense in being in a hurry to end the day when there is still valuable conversation going on.

1) It seems to me that town-you, having made a simple mistake earlier in the game that drew attention to yourself, would not immediately assume that RC was making a scum-slip because you would realize the parallels between the two actions. However scum-you, who realizes that the mistake you made actually is scummy, would try to press that tell when you saw someone else do it.

so... you are indeed saying that because I played the simple mistake card, I lose the right to call anyone out for anything that could be explained as a simple mistake. I think its wrong to first assume that an action is a simple mistake, because it takes away opportunities to find scum. Instead, I question about it, and wait to hear the response. If the response is "It was just a mistake", then fine. But I think its better for the town to let a player try to defend an action that might be scummy, when they might slip up defending themselves and reveal themself as scum, instead of just assuming it must have been a mistake and eliminating that opportunity to question a player and possibly catch a slip.

2) When I first read what you did to pops, I didn't assume it was a scum mistake. I assumed, just like I did with RC, that you simply forgot, which anyone could do. What changed my opinion was how you responded when people took note of it. You pulled out all this AtE claiming you were a VI, and then brought up the WIFOM of "scum are too careful to make little mistakes like this," which is all crap. I think you got jumpy when someone called you on a dumb mistake, which makes me think you've got a reason to be worried about the spotlight shining your way.

Right, so its a difference in gameplay then. I never assume something is an honest mistake. But, if a player uses that defense, then depending on the situation and the seriousness of the offense, I either believe them or I don't. I guess maybe this explains why I overreacted early in the game. I wouldn't have assumed my mistake was an honest mistake, so I thought nobody else would either, and I would have to "prove" that it was indeed just an honest mistake.

The way you word this makes it look like you're refuting one of my points, but basically what you're saying is you did misrep another player.

Again, whats your point? It wasn't a misrep, but it was an invalid argument because I missed where korts explained why he made posts promising to post. I withdrew my argument.

Now I'm confused... When I was first inconsistent with pops, you assumed it was an honest mistake. When RC re-voted me, you assumed honest mistake. But when I question korts, and it turns out to be invalid because I missed a comment, you don't assume honest mistake, you assume intentionally misrepping to fabricate a case... It seems more to me that you say you assumed whatever is going to help you most in whatever particular argument you're making at the time. Earlier, it makes me look scummier by saying you assumed honest mistakes left and right. Now, it makes me look scummier by saying you assumed mal intent.

I haven't been pushing the RC wagon at all.

O RLY?

As I've already explained, yes I have suspicions of RC. But I don't trust myself to be objective. I think having spoke up in opposition of the RC wagon BEFORE the accusation that I've been pushing the RC wagon from the sideline arrose supports my position. If I were pushing the RC wagon from the sideline, why would I just speak up against it knowing that I'm looking like the sure lynch if RC isn't lynched?

Rhinox thinks my point about 224 is not explained and not a case of backtracking.

I think this whole point is just splitting hairs anyways, because my whole accusation was recanted when I realized my error. Yes, if pops would have really jumped to RC's defense unprovoked, then I would have been speculating that it could have meant scum-pops defending scum-RC, or scum-pops defending town-rc, or town-pops defending town-rc. Instead of saying all those things, I decided to be a little provacative and diliberately accusatory. As I've said, it was early in the game. I was trying to stir up some conversation. Due to my inconsistency, I recalled my accusation, and the conversation never occured, at least not how I was expecting.

Also, I think this slight change in wording is more representative of what I was trying to say:

Here pops jumps to RC's defense after I asked RC questions, whithout giving RC a chance to answer the questions himself. In the same paragraph, however, its giving him a slight scum vibe. This sounds like fence-sitting,

and

or a bad attempt at distancing.

So out of the 10 or so accusations I've made against you, you only responded to 7 of them

Fine... lets see what I didn't respond to...

Not scummy but a flat 180 from "oh ad hom, you must not have a case," to using it himself. Same post.

You said it wasn't scummy, so I didn't consider it part of your case. The difference is, I was just trying to be an ass, and I wasn't using it to help build a case. Whereas, I feel RC only through it in as part of his manipulative arguing style and spin.

The only other points I didn't directly answer for in regards to your post is the AtE and WIFOM. I already said I wasn't touching the AtE anymore, because it is undefendable with commiting more AtE. As for the WIFOM, I still don't see why my use of WIFOM is inherantly scummy. As an analogy, I feel my use of WIFOM has been to point out where the wine is more likely to be, when in fact the wine is more likely to be there. I think WIFOM is only scummy when someone tries to insist where the wine is more likely to be when in facy the wine is not more likely to be there - either because its more likely to be somewhere else, or equally likely to be anywhere.

and I just destroyed 6 of them. Vote stays.

I don't really think you've destroyed anything.

RE: The bottom half of Rhinox's 311, if Rhinox flips scum I would be willing to wager he has a partner somewhere in Rishi/Pops/Huntress.

The way you say "flips" scum makes it sound like you would be suprised if I were scum - sounds a little odd coming from someone who strongly believes me to be scum.

[Rhinox]

CF Riot 354

Ok, I'm about sick of this line. What is wrong with you saying, "Hey guys, I got a little heated and stopped being logical for a bit. I'll try not to do that in the future."? It's not that you have to respond with AtE's, you're choosing to.

*head scratching* Didn't I try that?

Seriously though, I realize the idiotic irony of both my attacks, and my current defense of them. Nothing to do about it now except promise to do better, if you guys don't lynch me

I really wasn't thinking about the number of votes I had... based on the situation, I think a "oops, my bad, wasn't paying attention, didn't remember what I said, sorry" type of response was very apprpriate... maybe you have more of a problem with the wordiness of my statement rather than the actual content?

Further, I think the implication behind no trying to defend the AtE anymore is that I realize that I got a little flustered, and that I'm trying to put it behind me and do better, and avoid the use of emotional appeals in the future.

Ok, so say you asked RC that. RC says, "Well I think the town Banana Peeler should use his powers N1 on someone who's staying neutral because Banana Peels are more effective on SKs and I think neutral people are more likely SKs."

1) You may (as scum) infer from this that RC knows the town has a Banana Peeler. 2) Or you may infer that RC is not a Banana Peeler because he wouldn't openly choose his own role for the example. 3) Or you may be hoping that someone else answers your question for him, talking about some other random role. 4) I don't really care how you could interpret it

, I'm just saying that it has the potential to draw PR tells, and I really think you already know that.

I think you're really starting to stretch for this point now...

1) The only way RC would know whether the town had a banana peeler is if he was the banana peeler, which contradicts #2. Also, WE KNOW WHAT TOWN ROLES ARE POSSIBLE ALREADY. RC mentioning, for example, a jailer in this case wouldn't indicate any knowledge of the presence of that role. In a closed game, a mention of a role that we had no reason to believe was present might imply knowledge of the presence of that role.
2) Contradicts #1, which just goes to show that I wouldn't be able to come to a reliable conclusion about anybody being the banana peeler.
3) Actually, I want an answer from RC. If anyone else chose to answer, then A) it still wouldn't tell me anything about anyones role, and B) wouldn't be my fault since I'm specifically asking RC
4) Right... you don't care how its role fishing, only that it is, because you say so, because I'm scum, and saying that its rolefishing makes me seem more scum, even though you can't show how any PR tells will be outed, only that they might, so I'm scum.

*sigh* Remember that my argument is that no town players actions should change if they assume an sk D1, because there is no proof that there is an sk. If the banana peeler suggestion was a real suggestion, I would counter that the banana peeler should use his power on whoever was scummy, because even if an sk is more likely to be neutral, there is no way to know there is an SK right now, so its just as likely if not more likely that the banana peel would be wasted on a town player.

RE: Accidents vs Mal-intent. What you did doesn't look like something that can be explained as, "Whoops, I missed something you wrote." You directly quoted something he said, and described it in a way that I felt was misrepresentative of the quote. I don't see how anything else he said earlier or later could make that an "accident" on your part.

So, earlier korts accused pops of posting for the sake of posting, and thought it was scumy. Then, korts posts a "placeholder" post, which I interpret as posting for the sake of posting. Then Korts said he already explained why he makes placeholder posts, and that its not just posting for the sake of posting. To which I reply, "My bad, I missed that post."

So... what exactly did I misrep?

Well for one, this is WIFOM again, but the easy answer is to gain town cred if the RC wagon does go through. You're giving the town an alternative place to look for scum tomorrow if RC flips town, which takes heat off you and gives you something to add to any vote you make on someone who was on RC's wagon.

So, you now think RC is town and I'm going for town cred by speaking out against the wagon, since I know RC is not scum? What if RC is scum... I suppose that makes me his scum partner since I'm trying to "derail" his lynch. But according to OGML, it only makes sense that one of us is mafia and the other is sk... so see what I'm getting at? you've already spun conclusions tied into RC, that makes me scum no matter what RC's allignment is. In other words, I'm scum, so my actions are scummy aka circular logic. This is whats frustrating me the most. Everything I'm saying is pretty much being looked at through "Rhinox is scum" glasses - instead of looking at what I'm saying and determining my allignment from what I'm saying. Its easy to rationalize how an action could be scummy if I'm scum, but thats completely different than saying that same action indicates I am more likely scum. In this specific situation, in order for speaking out against the RC wagon to indicate that I'm scum, you would have to show that scum-me would only speak out against the wagon, while town-me would be for it. I don't think you can make that case.

Hahaha. Would you rather me say "after you flip scum, which I'm 100% sure of,"? SpyreX already tried that and you don't seem to like that either.

My interpretation is that someone only "flips" an allignment if you don't believe they are that allignment. For example, I think playerA is town, but he's getting wagoned. He ends up being scum. Next day I comment that I have to re-read, because my analysis are all messed up due to player A flipping scum when I thought he was town. Alternatively, I think player B is scum, and he ends up being lynched scum. I wouldn't say "oh, he flipped scum". It wouldn't be a flip, it would be exactly what I thought.

So when you say, "if Rhinox flips scum", instead of "if rhinox is really scum" it makes me think you would be suprised if I were scum - thus, implying inside knowledge that you know I'm not scum.

-----------------------------

Pops 355

Rhinox's explanation of the overreaction to misreading the thread is pretty good, but it's several pages late. And sorry Rhinox, the unpressed Vanilla claiming definitely gives off the appearance that you are a newbie.

I can't even shoot down my own newbie card... well I'll run with it then. I'm just a newbie making newbie mistakes, everybody should cut me some slack.

^^^ not AtE, just sarcasm.

Maybe you're right about the claim being premature... but it stemmed from frustration of feeling like everything else I was saying was digging me a bigger whole, and I felt out of ways to defend myself. Maybe it was a newbish thing to do. If that makes me a newb, so be it. I'm always the first to admit theres still a lot I have to learn.

-----------------------------

@Spy: ROFL Thanks for the humor. I needed that.

-----------------------------

I realize IAUN has some more questions I have to answer. I might be able to get to them later tonight, or tomorrow.

[Rhinox]

@ Rhinox - "flip" is fairly common terminology, so you are reading too much into that IMO. It refers (at least I think) to flipping over a card and revealing the information on the other side (in this case - alignment). Might have started from live mafia (do they use cards)?

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that is where it comes from.

That actually makes sense. I didn't think about it like that.

@CFR 364:

I guess we agree to disagree then.

So, yea, I'm takin it quiet for the next few days. Lynch whomever, I'll check in and throw my vote if it looks like we're going to hit a NL.

What exactly is pro-town about this philosophy?

------------------------------------------------

Another argument I've been swishing around in this noggin of mine is how come Rhinox is on such pins and needles over being lynched as a vanilla townie today. On the one hand, his determination gives me some doubt about my vote, but on the other I really starting to worry if he's not taking serious the possibility that he could be lynched today. What I mean to say is, I'd really like to see him giving this town his own interpretation of the game outside of defending himself, should he be lynched and come up as town. For him not to bother making a few predictions, at least in addition to his defense, is a tell to me. I don't think what he's said about OGML is good enough, and I think there are some players he has neglected to really address.

Huh? are you telling me I should roll over and play dead because I'm just a townie and I shouldn't care if I get lynched D1, or are you accusing me of doing nothing but defend myself? I think I've been doing a good job of doing things besides defend myself. I have a case on OGML, I've been talking with Spy about his list of 3, I've tried making other cases... Even after this post:

I'm sure there will be something wrong with this explanation as well, but whatever... I feel a common fault of townies under pressure is that they become 100% defensive, and stop making cases. Then, right before they're lynched, someone throws on top "you haven't even been scum hunting all game, you've only been focused on not getting yourself lynched" as sort of a nail in the coffin. Its understandable thought... its hard to get a word out when you're getting screamed at from every direction. Despite being under enormous suspicion, I was at least trying to continue scumhunting, but even that turned out to be total phail due to an oversight on my part.

...you go ahead and accuse me of exactly what I said I was actively trying to avoid...

The second question, no, I don't see a reason for a townie player to try to cloud rational thought and judgment.

Thank you. So, AtE is only an attempt to cloud rational thought and judgement if I'm scum. So it is circular reasoning. "I'm scum, so I'm attempting to cloud the towns judgement and its scummy" not, "an AtE is an attempt to cloud judgment, so I'm scum".

If you want to consider it that way, but I don't mean for it to be.

I mean, unless you want to argue that it is advantageous to be able to post once a day around 1-4 AM CST?

I'm arguing that it doesn't put you at the disadvantage you're trying to make it seem. not disadvantage != advantage.

Either I'm misreading this completely, or this is just a bad approach to the game.

You would love to see me lynched, yet you don't think I'm scum, yet you can't analyze me objectively, yet you think there is merit in the case against me...

I think you're misreading, but I'm not sure how to explain any better. We're clashing right now. You're voting me, when I know I'm town. Because of that, I can't analyze you objectively. I don't know whether my points have merit or not. I feel if I voted for you, it would basically be OMGUS and not because I think you're likely scum. So I'm consciously fighting the urge to do that.

1) Huh? I don't think that; this is a loaded question. I asked you why OGML is a better lynch than me because you were voting him. Additionally, you've stated that you don't think I'm scum. Because of these two positions, I asked you why you thought OGML was better to be lynched today than I was.
2) No.
3) No.

My point is, why would you ask me to explain why OGML is a better lynch than you? That would be like if asked asked bio why you are a better lynch choice than me. It basically feels like an admission that you realize you're being scummy. When I read your question, it says to me that you don't think I should be voting OGML, and instead should be voting you.

Anyways, why did you ask me if you already knew the answer? I said I'm njot sure you're scum and don't trust myself to analyze you objectively. I gave reasons for suspecting OGML. Whats the point of even asking me?

Because, frankly, I think you are getting away with a lot.

90% is obviously an exaggeration, but I'm more confident in my suspicions of you than I am in pops.

I'm not going to deny I'd rather lynch you that myself, do you expect me to? This doesn't change the fact that I think you are scummy and that I was the first, non-random vote on you. Your misrepresentation of my motivations just reinforces my vote.

It just seems like you're playing from a position that only my lynch today will cause you to not be lynched. I wouldn't expect you to accept your own lynch over anybody else, but I would much rather be sure you were voting for who you thought was most likely scum. Your posts on the subject have been misleading. I get the feeling that if you weren't being wagoned and close to a lynch, that you would much rather be voting pops. Your posts give me the impression that you don't think pops can be realistically lynched today, so you'd rather see me lynched because that means you're not getting lynched. You've clarified that you say I'm your top suspect, but I still think you've been misleading. I get the feeling that you're only acting out of self preservation, than voting for who you think is most likely scum.

Keep in mind that if I were playing by your philosophy, you'd have already been lynched. You were at L-1. I could have hammered you, or at least pressured you into claiming and then hammered you, instead of speaking out against your wagon. I don't care who cries WIFOM, but scum-me wouldn't try to stall your wagon when it was obvious I would be the next lynch choice (unless we're both on the same mafia team).

What does this mean? How is this not doublespeak?

How can I be neither town nor scum?

i'm really getting tired and annoyed at arguing semantics... not scum != town. It just means, I haven't come to a conclusion that I think you're more likely 1 side more than the other. In other words, I have a neutral read on you right now. I don't think your scum, but i wouldn't call you town.

I'm not going to say personality isn't a significant factor, I'm certainly not going to say this is foolproof, but it's worked for me countless times, and I think I'm getting better and better at telling the differences between townie appeals and scum appeals. Rhinox very much falls into the latter category for me.

Well then at least after I'm lynched, I can take pleasure in knowing that I'm completely wrecking yours and everyone's meta on what is and isn't scum/town tells. Except for the 3-4 of you that are scum and know I'm town already.

I'm voting Rhinox right now though, because of the vanilla claim. If he's town you're next.
-------------------------------------
But afaik, unless someone has more developed theory concepts than me, we need to lynch him because of the claim.

Pops, can you please explain why you feel you have to have a policy to lynch vanilla claims on D1?

When the initial statement in the question was pointed out as incorrect, you decided it was best to spin into a whole side thing about how I am reading Rhinox and because I use meta as a factor, I must have a town meta-read on him.

I think if everyone took a look at RC's posts without the "Rhinox is scum" pretext, then you'll notice that RC's posts are full of manipulative spin.

I'm starting to think more and more that RC is scum, but I'm still not willing to trust my own judgement about RC.

[Rhinox]

you lynch claimed vanilla because claimed vanilla makes it easier for the scum to nightkill power roles by process of elimination.

I'm not following the logic... lynching me doesn't make it any harder for the scum to nk a power role. Lynching me also removes a town player from the game, so thats 1 less player that scum have to nk to gain a majority.

On the other hand, when a player gets to L-1 and claims vanilla, you usually still lynch them if you still think they're scum, because any scum player can easily fake claim vanilla.

But lynching me because I claimed vanilla and that makes it easier for scum to nk power roles is just silly as a policy, because lynching me doesn't give the town back any of that lost advantage - actually puts the town at an even bigger disadvantage by eliminating a town player through a lynch instead of a nk.

[Rhinox]

So, yea, I'm takin it quiet for the next few days. Lynch whomever, I'll check in and throw my vote if it looks like we're going to hit a NL.

Why is everyone just ignoring this comment?

[Rhinox]

I haven't seen it either

[Rhinox]

That said, RC is completely right about Rhinox's defense of "I didn't hammer." To argue that this is a town-tell is beyond weak. Aside from the fact that a premature hammer is begging for attention, I had just replaced in and took RC off of L-1 so the tides were definitely shifting at the time.

I never said that was a town tell. I was just pointing out a fallacy in RC's comments. RC has made comments that makes me think he's OK with anyone being lynched besides himself, because he's the only one he knows is town. By that logic, I should be arguing for RC's lynch, because he's probably the only one I could hope to be lynched today besides myself.

That being said, I've become increasing more uncomfortable with RC after his last few posts. I'm still not sure if he's scum, but if a vote is needed at deadline, I'd be willing to vote him to prevent a no-lynch.

[Rhinox]

Moriarty147, can you compare and contrast the two most popular wagons for us?

Extremely tired atm, will do so later today.

pops, is there a reason you're specifically asking Moriarty? this request seems a bit... odd.

I'm at Mardi Gras right now

jealousy...

I always said I would make it down there some year before I have to grow up... shoulda made it this year, because I'm getting married in June...

[Rhinox]

I'm pretty sure I know which way everyone else is going to go today barring anything major.

Just out of curiosity, which way do you think I would go?

[Rhinox]

@Rhinox - i was inquiring everyone who was not on either major wagon. I skipped you, Rhinox, for obvious reasons.
I pay less attention to Moriarty because she spends less time pushing crap on me. Sorry. Sue me.

This is a bit of an overreaction, I think. I was just wondering why you felt the need to single moriarty out with a question. No hidden implication behind it, no hidden attack, just curiousity.

[Rhinox]

are you not the same one who was all "rawr, pops is lurker hunting one player at a time, rawr, he's being biased, rawr". I get irritated about things the second time. If you're not the same person who bugged me once, sorry.

uhhh... no? I don't think so? I have no idea what you're talking about

[Rhinox]

Well I believe Bio's CC - no reason for scum to counter just to get to myslynch a jailer. I also don't like how OGML immediately jumped in suggesting 2 jailers... I guess its theoretically possible, but its not a role I would expect more than 1 of. I think its a more powerful role than pops is making it out to be.

I think spy's vote puts RC at L-1. If there are no objections, I'll place the hammer vote. I have an hour before I might not have access until after deadline, so I'll hammer by 3:45 EST (GMT -5:00) unless people are begging me to wait, or somebody else hammers first.

[Rhinox]

unvote; vote: RedCoyote

Can't promise to be back before deadline, so as promised, there's the hammer.

[Rhinox]

f

[Rhinox]

Wow. Just... wow.

Vi, very interesting game, and no qualms from me about your modding. /pre-in for whatever you run next.

On the setup, it is my belief that 2 mafia + sk + 9 town setups are always town favored. The first I was in was over in 2 game days. In this game, the town didn't make a successful mafia kill until lynching Rishi, yet still managed to win But hey, why am I complaining, I won!

In all seriousness, I'm really disappointed with my play in this game. I was definately way off my game - easily this was my worst performance since joining the site. Thanks to the rest of the town for getting the job done despite my abyssmal performance. The only little bit of redemption I got was being a N1 nk, instead of being left alive to be lynched eventually. I take pride in getting myself nightkilled when I'm vanilla town, and although this was not the way I expected it to happen, it saved the town from being forced to lynch me later.

All in all, I think everyone else played pretty solidly. I had no idea how this was going to end, and I was glad I was just a spectator because I didn't even want to try to figure it out.

[Rhinox]

It was fun to act like there was only one scum group the entire game and secretly try to figure out why the kills didn't go through. I guess there was never an appropriate time to speculate about an SK like RC wanted to do

hehe whats ironic is after you guys were essentially sure there was a second scum group, nobody went back to the day 1 sk talk to look for any clues (not saying there were any, but I guess it just shows that the early sk talk didn't matter 1 bit.

Rhinox WAS scummy

Agreed. I played very poorly.