Finally have some time here. Thanksgiving travel is a pain.
I'm going to provide full analysis on all other players in the game, time permitting. First, here's the Cliffs' Cliffs' Notes version (for future reference):
Vollkan: probably scum
MoS: leaning scum
Pwayne: not sure
Trojan Horse: leaning town
Tar: judge for yourself
Now, let's start off with an analysis of my top scum candidate:
vollkan wrote:flameaxe wrote: *gasp* I do not approve of this.
Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't the "edit" quoted by Pwayne part of Blackstrike's signature.
This is kind of obvious when you consider that blackstrike posted at:
Wed Sep 05, 2007 10:14 am Post subject: 13
But the signature edit thing reads:
Last edited by Dr. Blackstrike on Sat Sep 01, 2007 12:45 am; edited 1 times in total
Unless blackstrike has a TARDIS, there is nothing odd about it...
Information? Yes. Analysis? No. Scumhunting? Definitely not. Scum trying to use information instead of analysis to give the perception that they are participating? Quite possibly.
vollkan wrote:Black wrote:
How many townies are in the game?
Can't help you there.
Black wrote:
I would say that in this game, a townie lynch is almost as good as a scum lynch.
Why? Townies are the lifeblood of the cult. No townies= no recruits, No recruits= good.
Therefore, any townie claim should be punishable by lynch.
Interesting. It is true that any claimed vanilla will almost certainly be cultised but a townie lynch is not "almost as good" as a scum lynch. If we get into the situation where someone is forced to claim vanilla, then we are basically forced to lynch a townie. It is not a good thing; it is a situation best avoided.
Plus, remember that even if the vanilla lynches hurt the cult, they help the mafia. There are two enemies we need to consider.
In short, if someone does claim vanilla they really force our hand. But that just demonstrates that the vanillas should do all they can to avoid having to claim.
Black wrote:
Other things:
a) How much of an effect would it have on balance if the cult leader was the day one lynch?
b) How many townies are likely in the game? There need to be enough to give the cult a chance along with power roles to help us get the cult/mafia.
a) Depends on the set-up
b) I've never been in a cult game before, so I can't really say.
Black wrote:
Therefore:
I think that townies should try get killed by the mafia. It hurts the cult.
This is so wrong!
IF every vanilla began to try and get killed by the scum (I assume that you mean that the vanillas should play very well and draw attention to themselves) then the logical response for the scum would be to target quieter players and for the cult to target the loudest. This ends up in WIFOM, of course, but the point is that imposing some sort of uniform strategy will only serve to sort power roles from vanillas. In short, your strategy does the very OPPOSITE of what you suggest its purpose is.
Once again - lots of information and discussion (this time mostly about mafia theory), but very little scumhunting.
vollkan wrote:Cross-posted.
Black wrote:
Well my point is that townies are the lifeblood of the cult and if all the townies die than the cult is nuetralized.
Read my post above. This logic is utterly pro-scum. (I say pro-scum to distinguish it from anti-town that also helps the cult)
So, you're saying that a player's logic is pro-scum, but you don't draw the logical conclusion and suggest that he *is* scum (or provide reasons why you think he is town despite his bad logic)? I can't see a good reason for town to fail to point out these conclusions, but I can think of at least three good reasons for scum to do so (bussing, giving the appearance of bussing to cast doubt on a townie, and scum not wanting to step on toes).
vollkan wrote:
I just read the rules again and we have exactly 4-6 recruitable people.
Reading from the front page:
12 players: 1 Cult. 2 Scum. 2-4 power roles.
Therefore, 5-7 are vanilla.
More information, still no scumhunting. A pattern is emerging here, and it's one that suggests that Vollkan is scum himself.
vollkan wrote:Trojan Horse wrote:
I had a thought: how on earth are we going to handle claims at the start of the game? Once we've reached a consensus on who is scummy, should we demand a claim from that person? If we do, and that person says "townie", we're in a bit of a pickle. It may well be best to lynch them; they may be lying, and even if they're not, it'll deny the cult a possible recruit.
I said this back in post #34.
At this stage of the game, I think the only real difference the cult makes to play strategy is that it provides a good reason for lynching claimed vanillas. A vanilla lynch is still very bad, because it helps the scum, but it is better than the cult gaining members.
Flameaxe wrote:
I don't think lynching vanillas is a good idea. Period. Lets get the cult recruiter D1 so we don't even have to worry bout it. Kk?
Easier said than done.
Flameaxe wrote:
I'm gonna have to agree with this post entirely. Everything I've heard from you has been from a 'culty' point of view. You just really seem like you don't want to help the town that much and are more worried about eliminating the amount of recruitable townies...aka...the vanilla ones...
I'm not a fan of your play...and I think pressure would be a nice discussion starter right now...Unvote, Vote: Dr. Blackstrike
Hang on. You are saying that BS sounds 'culty' because he wants to eliminate the vanillas? And you voted on the basis of this.
Flame wrote:
Pwayne wrote:
While there may be instances where lynching vanilla is of benefit, I think those instances are rare. But yes, we are better of we dead vanillas then recruited vanillas.
To me, this strategy just seems like the cult is all that matters here. THERE IS STILL A MAFIA, AND THEY DO HAVE A WIN CONDITION. Lynching vanillas fights back against the cultists, but is basically helping the mafia get closer to a win.
You're misrepresenting what was said. Pwayne was clearly not calling for the lynch of vanillas, he was saying (as I have been also) that a dead vanilla is better than a claimed and therefore recruited vanilla.
Flame wrote:
BS wrote:
I'm not advocating lynching townies as much as I'm advocating them trying to be killed in the night by the mafia. Why? I repeat, because it's another night that has gone by without a power role dying and one less potential cultist.
Wouldn't a townie want the mafia to kill the CULTISTS...so the town could, I dunno. Win?
There are real problems with vanillas trying to be NKed, I addressed those earlier. Of course, ideally the mafia will NK the cultists, but second to that the best thing is for the mafia to NK vanillas. It means we don't lose our power roles and it makes the cult's job more difficult.
Flame's voting basis is ridiculous. His subsequent attempts to justify it on the basis of pressure ignore the fact that discussion was happening anyway. Plus, he seems adamantly against the lynching of vanillas. "Period".
Unvote, Vote: Flameaxe
Cool, a vote with a reason on it. Of course, that reason is total BS. Vollkan said two posts earlier that Dr. Blackstrike's logic was anti-town, failed to act on it, then votes Flameaxe for making the pro-town play that he failed to act on earlier? The rest of his attack is even worse - it basically consists of attacking Flameaxe for advocating pro-town play. That's scummy as all hell.
(Aside: Pwayne's quoted comments about vanilla lynching are pinging my scumdar. I'll need to examine closely when I get time for the Pwayne PBPA.)
vollkan wrote:Flame wrote:
Tell me right now, what is the fucking problem with not wanting to lynch vanillas? Nothing wrong with trying to lynch the goddamn scum.
Nobody is calling for the lynch of all vanillas; that's a strawman you have raised.
Let me make this perfectly clear to you: A lynch of a mafia or cult leader is great. That is what we want. However, if someone claims vanilla then it makes sense to lynch them, since they will in all likelihood be culted. It is not that vanilla lynches are good, nobody except the mafia will want a vanilla lynch, but it is a practical necessity in a cult game.
Flame wrote:
The way he (and alot of people so far) have been viewing this game is that it is Town Vs. Cult. I don't really like repeating myself so many times like this, but what the hell. Mafia. That should be all I have to say.
Way back in #34 I even said:
Vollkan wrote:
Plus, remember that even if the vanilla lynches hurt the cult, they help the mafia. There are two enemies we need to consider.
And you know what, in BS's next post he admitted I was correct. His plan was anti-town, sure, but he abandoned it once it was pointed out and it really just looks like a honest mistake.
Since then, nobody has said "Vanilla lynches are good" and ignored the mafia. The point, which you evidently miss, is that a dead vanilla is better than a claimed vanilla who will get recruited.
Flame wrote:
Get rid of the cult recruiter early, get rid of the scum later, win.
Your logic is just so wrong. You seem to be saying that we should not lynch claimed vanillas but we should lynch the cult recruiter. Fine. Let's say person X is the recruiter. If X is put at L-1, I wonder what role X will claim....vanilla most likely.
If you can explain to me how we go about lynching the recruiter (or Mafia) and being certain that they are the recruiter/mafia then I would love to hear it.
Flame wrote:
If you still think my vote was entirely baseless, please go back to pages 1 and 2 and read some of the things he had to say. They all look necessarily
anti-town to me. (Not from the culty perspective exactly, but anti-town.)
You've admitted the culty label was wrong.
His plan was anti-town, but he abandoned it once I pointed out how flawed it was. That said, he was correct about lynching claimed vanillas and he was right to suggest that vanillas being NKed is a good way for the cult to be weakened (though his plan was deeply flawed in terms of execution).
More craplogic. Vollkan once again states that my predecessor's logic was anti-town, yet he still won't bring up the obvious (albeit incorrect) possible explanation. The rest of his post effectively consists of attacking Flameaxe for attempting to get the town to scumhunt instead of discuss theory about the cult. That's not pro-town in my books.
vollkan wrote:Pwayne wrote:
There is one way around all the controversy: Nobody claim vanilla townie until the recruiter is dead. I think that is at the root of everything. If nobody claims, nobody gets lynched and nobody appears scummy for going after townies.
Well, there are two circumstances where people might claim:
1) My randomly mentioning it in discussion (I have seen this in other games, people just saying "I'm vanilla")
or;
2) At L-1 if they are forced to claim
1) is always a bad idea even in a regular game and here it provides a good case for being lynched.
2) is slightly more complicated. If a vanilla is at L-1 and is asked to claim, they basically have 3 choices:
a) Claim vanilla = Lynched
b) Don't claim anything = By not claiming they are indicating they are vanilla (or potentially scum/cult leader who does not want to risk claiming a power role). Hence, they are effectively doing the same thing as a).
c) Claim a power role. This gives rise to another 3:
i) They claim a role which nobody else has. No counter-claim & probably NKed
ii) They get counter-claimed. They will be lynched and counter-claimer gets NKed. Not good, obviously.
iii) They claim a role someone else has, but that person does not counter-claim. This should cause the power-claiming vanilla to be NKed. If not, then things get confusing.
All in all, things are messy...
Another Vollkan post that gives information/game theory instead of scumhunting.
vollkan wrote:Cross-posted.
CKD wrote:
That being said, I DO NOT THINK ANYONE SHOULD CLAIM Day 1. There has been a lot of talk about claiming or when to claim, but I do not think it is a good idea.
See my post above for how messy the claiming thing is. The only circumstance where claiming today will be pro-town is if you are a power role at L-1, other than that a claim will likely be of no help.
More of the tell that I will henceforth call Information Instead of Scumhunting (IIoS).
vollkan wrote:
Just for the record, my vote on Flameaxe was and is totally random.
Then unvote.
MoS wrote:
Why is everyone voting Flameaxe?
Trojan wrote:
I don't know about this bandwagon on Flameaxe; to me, he hasn't acted any scummier than anyone else.
I'll give my reasons:
1) Making a serious vote for BS on the basis of BS being 'culty'. A nonsensical justification (and possibly a freudian one)
2) Justifying the vote on the basis of pressure and discussion. BS was already talking and discussion was already happening
3) Misrepresenting the case for lynching claimed vanillas, presumably to legitimise his vote on BS
1) That's funny, I thought that voting someone because you think that they look scummy (and, by Occam's Razor, probably are scum) was good play for town. Is there a reason that you disagree, Vollkan?
2) Um, that seems like a blatant misrepresentation of Flameaxe's case to me. "Player X's actions are scummy IMO and I'm calling him out on it" seems like a much more accurate summary to me.
3) Not necessarily incorrect (though it's possible that Flameaxe simply misunderstood your arguments), but given Vollkan's misrepresentation of Flameaxe's case it is hypocritical.
vollkan wrote:Oman wrote:
Rump wrote:
Yeah, I don't know what's going to make me look scummy or not. (That probably made me look scummy, but I wouldn't know.)
Its not your problem IF you're town. Your problem is finding scum, not getting out squeaky clean.
For the record, I said almost exactly the same thing as Rump is saying now in my first game of mafia. The "everything I say can be turned against me" fear is something I had and which a lot of newbies whinge about.
Cool information, now where's the scumhunting?
vollkan wrote:<snip mod edit>
I'll try to kickstart this:
Rump explaining
Rump wrote:
Mostly because he seemed to misinterpret BS's post to, as vollkan said, legitimize his post . However, looking back, I can understand how anyone would misinterpret that.
This doesn't explain anything really.
The reasons in brief given by me were:
Vollkan wrote:
1) Making a serious vote for BS on the basis of BS being 'culty'. A nonsensical justification (and possibly a freudian one)
2) Justifying the vote on the basis of pressure and discussion. BS was already talking and discussion was already happening
3) Misrepresenting the case for lynching claimed vanillas, presumably to legitimise his vote on BS
Fine, you think 3) is possibly understandable; but what about the rest of these?
Also, Tyhess respond to CKD and Pwayne.
Vollkan wants other people's reactions to his points, which is pro-town. First time I've said that in this PBPA. Asking another player to respond to another person's comments, however... feels like scum trying to blend in by encouraging discussion.
vollkan wrote:Theo wrote:
Mainly because he jumped to the Doctor's defence - I can see scum doing this if Doctor's town - he was incredibly scummy first three or so pages and doesn't want us to assert pressure and bullying tactics to catch scum - I see that as very anti-town whatever the method of game. Seperately I've seen a lot of scum do them list things, ppl think they look great, so scum do the odd one liners to impress. Anyways all for now.
Well, I also said that BS looked like he had simply made an "honest mistake" and Oman said that
Oman wrote: I think our good doctor has tried (and phailed!) to come up with a good plan.
So, in terms of "defending" BS, Pwayne is hardly singular.
Something else,
Theo wrote:
Mainly because he jumped to the Doctor's defence
and now,
Theo wrote:
I don't like pwayne more for his suggestion to not use pressure votes and bully players etc. Plus his recent list doesn't sit too well with me.
Subtle shift. People criticise you for voting on the basis of Pwayne defending BS, so you shift you main reason to being the opposition to bullying, which was a minor factor from before.
Does this mean that your basis for suspecting Pwayne is that he is opposed to bullying tactics? If so, why does that make him more likely to be scum? I personally have no problem with bullying tactics, but I have encountered many players that oppose them.
Points out flaws in Theo's logic, asks for explanation. I've seen this kind of behavior from town and scum in the past, so I'd call it a null tell. The bigger question is, what will Vollkan do if/when Theo explains?
vollkan wrote:Theo wrote:
It's more the tone of your post that I find an over-reaction.
The post, I presume:
Oman wrote:
I don't like that vote on Pwayne at all. I think the defence of a play whos alignment is unknown should not factor into the concept at all. We have three factions here, only one of them knows who the others in their faction are (there is only one cultist now, scum know eachother). I don't like the idea of Pwayne being scum because BS looks scummy, but you say Pwayne is scummy is BS is town as well...hmmm.
I don't like it really.
I don't see any "tone" beyond a slight hint of Oman being suspicious of you. Given the basis for your vote, however, I think that is wholly reasonable.
FoS: Theo
So, when Theo elaborates, Vollkan's response (to an explanation that is, in my eyes, far scummier than Flameaxe's early play) is a FoS. There are two likely explanations here:
1) Vollkan genuinely thought that Flameaxe was scummy and delayed moving his vote onto Theo because of this.
2) Theo was Vollkan's scumbuddy, and this post is a textbook example of the Friend of Scum (FoS) tell.
vollkan wrote:Theo wrote:
Ok looking back the tone doesn't seem all that bad, it did originally jump out at me that Oman commented on nothinge else and I found it puzzling that he (Oman) doesn't express any outright suspicion on me, it's more a defence of Pwanye if that makes sense - probably not. I guess if anything I over-reacted to Oman's original post
Wait, hang on. You accused him over-reaction but now you are saying you were actually puzzled he did not suspect you outright?
And no, don't try to turn this into a game of people defending Pwayne, the issue is people attacking your vote.
Theo wrote:
I've got my eye on pwayne because I found him defending Blackstrike more than anyone, asking Curious/Flame in 45 to not bully him, not use pressure votes to extract information.
Way to go and dodge the shifting I just pointed out:
[quote="Vollkan]
Something else,
Theo wrote:
Mainly because he jumped to the Doctor's defence
and now,
Theo wrote:
I don't like pwayne more for his suggestion to not use pressure votes and bully players etc. Plus his recent list doesn't sit too well with me.
Subtle shift. People criticise you for voting on the basis of Pwayne defending BS, so you shift you main reason to being the opposition to bullying, which was a minor factor from before.
Now what you have just done is to combine them all together as salient factors, but it is yet another shift from your previous positions.
Theo wrote:
As far as pwayne not being the only one to defend Blackstrike again I'm being overly attacking towards him, I will say he was more defensive than anyone else but Oman, Volkan do both show support for him only after Tyhess votes Blackstrike for acting oddly. Oman then shows support, Trojan follows up straight after - more a following kinda post - similar to his one above, Volkan you then do so.
I find it interesting that you represent several people taking a common position (which happens to be against your view or your vote) as "following".
Theo wrote:
Hence perhaps I'm being severly misguided on Pwayne's defensive nature, defensive players could just as likely be town/scum and without having any prior knowledge of meta-gaming of Pwayne unvote - after all I only re-read properly a couple of hours ago.
I don't see why you only recently re-reading affects your ability to vote for sensible reasons.
For that very slippery response, you've been upgraded to first class:
Unvote, Vote: Theo
[/quote]
Theo's next response is enough to convince Vollkan to vote Theo, with solid reasoning. Whoa, a pro-town action.
NOTE: Vollkan's reasoning here seems far more sincere than his reasoning on Flameaxe (a preliminary readthrough suggests it is also more sincere than many of Vollkan's later cases, too). This, to me, suggests that if Vollkan is scum, then MoS (Theo's replacement) is likely to be his buddy - from scum play I've seen in the past (including my own play as scum in games such as Mini 462 and Stargate SG-1), scum find it much, much easier to bring up a case on a fellow scum than to fabricate a case on a player they know is not Mafia. Something to keep in mind for later.
vollkan wrote:BS, tag fixed by Tar wrote:
Theo wrote:
Ok to finish early good list - Flameaxe, Curious, Volkan. Not really any vibe - MoS, Oman, ac1983fan, Trojan Horse. Not liking a lot probably due to newbishness/scummyness - RumpWat, Tyhess. Not liking even less - pwayne66, Dr.B.
Does anyone else see the odd thing I notice about this list?
The fact that Theo says he doesn't like one group due to "scummyness" but then lists Pwayne and BS as "even less" initially looked a little odd to me, but not after I thought about it. It looks like he is just saying that you two are the top of his suspect list.
Unless, as I suspect, you are talking about something else.
That's some awfully wishy-washy (and therefore scummy) analysis there...
I do not have time to finish this PBPA tonight (will do ASAP), but here's a good start.
