/Invitational 11: Pick your Poison 5 (Game Over)

[ekiM]

First thing I notice is that Day 0 deadline is the 11th of August. No rush.

---

I massively prefer bankable deadlines because they don't give weird incentives to drag out the day and will give more time later on if we need it.

VOTE: Bankable deadlines

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Weak
~

Tracker

- The weakest of the info roles, the others can find a confirmed innocent each night, this dude has a low chance of finding anything at all.

Vig

- Doubled-edged but sharp.

Jailkeeper

- Somewhat useful early, much better later.

Hider

- Can find an innocent each night, gets riskier later on.

Weak doc

- Likely finds an innocent N1 and can keep them alive indefinitely, or go looking for more.
~
Strong

I think we probably have two trackers and some combination of JKs and vigs, possibly a hider.

I highly doubt we have two hiders or docs so I'm opposed to Zorblag's plan.

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In terms of mafia roles, three of them are for dealing with power roles, and one is for general mindscrew. I've not had to deal with no-reveal before but to me it sounds like hell. I don't want to play Day 1 twice. Unless I'm convinced otherwise I'm discounting janitor.

Of the others, I think rolecop is the strongest. Infinite shot, day use, day talk. It's going to allow them to find roles quickly. The other two are useless for finding roles, and shots in the dark if roles haven't been found. If we went with this idea of allowing claims but not treating them as averting a lynch, then the only way they'd find roles is by luck, quite low odds. So my initial thinking is that Assassin and Roleblocker are the way to go.

[ekiM]

@mod

"During day 0, you can vote and unvote as normal, except that you have two votes, since you're giving the mafia two perks. You can't put both your votes on the same perk. Once both perks are chosen, the game starts."

What exactly is the procedure here? If a role gets 11 votes is it then "locked in" and everyone has one vote for the second role? Or?

---

OK I changed my mind on the "lynch all claims to screw with the assassin" thing. Not worth it.

I think if we decide whether we can deal with a janitor or not first that clarifies thinking.

If we have a janitor then roleblocker. If no janitor then roleblocker and assassin?

[ekiM]

The hider-claim seems bad to me.

The "game breaking benefits" only come if we have two hiders and I would bet money that we do not. Scum would have to be fools not to notice the synergy, and I doubt we have four fools as scum with this player list.

If we discount the two hider case then... I don't see the advantage of claiming over not claiming. At all. If we knew there could only be one hider would we advocate a claim right away?

I'm also dubious about the idea that we might want to be using JK/Doc to protect a hider orrrrrrr using a vig to test it.

---

I'm feeling less bad about janitor. We're going to see something like ten deaths before we're at LYLO, at a bare minimum. How much effect is not knowing the flip of one of those going to have?

[ekiM]

@ekiM, the potential benefits of two hiders to the town and danger to the mafia be largely negated by town picking a role blocker for the scum. Troll thinks that essentially everyone who has chimed in has said that roleblocker be the first choice them would make (Troll would have to go back and check that but it be at least close to what has happened.) Troll thinks that if scum considered hider a weak role (and we be talking about a role that can get itself killed by hiding with mafia, hiding with obv town that mafia kills or hiding with whoever any potential vigilante's choose to kill; despite the potential to clear townies it be a dicey role on it's own) them would have been tempted to double it up if them could count on the synergy being countered (which them almost certainly could.)

Two confirmed and unkilllable town players is game breaking. I don't believe scum would allow even the possibility of that happening, given a choice. Even if they assumed that they would have a roleblocker then it might get killed off before the hiders were outed, leaving no way to deal, and the game handed to town. I think mafia players are generally adverse to game-ending risks.

The chances of having two hiders in the game be slim but them exist. If them be there then we be fools not to use them.

It's not true that we should take the chance just because it exists. If the chances of two hiders was 50% then a claim would be good. If it was 0.02% then it would be bad. The true chance lies somewhere in between, but I can't evaluate it quantitatively. I think it's rather low, though, so I'm opposed to this plan.

If there no were a chance to have multiple hiders Troll probably wouldn't have suggested a hider claim.

I don't believe that we have multiple hiders.

[ekiM]

Ummm, hardly anyone supports hider claim? It's pointless unless you think there's a reasonable chance we have 2 of them. Shall we just vote on these things and then we can vote on roles.

Hider claim?
Yes - 0 ()
No - 1 (ekiM)

Massclaim?
Yes - 0 ()
No - 1 (ekiM)

Add your votes.

[ekiM]

Was pretty sure over half supported it.

Nah, a vocal minority supported it. Not the same thing.

Zorb's point was that scum, if they assumed getting Roleblocker was a pretty safe bet, might have done it, and that if they haven't it's extremely low risk.

They

might

have decided to gamble with the possibility of giving a huge advantage to town. I just find that scenario

massively

less likely than one where they didn't. If they didn't we either find there are no hiders, which is a small benefit, or we out one hider, which is fairly bad (either we're pushed away from RB or we go with RB anyway and they're neutralized).

Hider claim?
Yes - 2 (Plumegranate, mith)
No - 7 (ekiM, Amished, PZ, Rhinox, Vas, Hoopla, Spyrex)

Massclaim?
Yes - 1 (Hoopla)
No - 7 (ekiM, Plumegranate, Amished, PZ, Rhinox, Vas, SpyreX)

[ekiM]

Can people hammer the second deadline option? Might as well get it out of the way.

[ekiM]

Meh.

I am not a Hider.

2 claims: The best then is rolecop and assassin I think.. way less likely to be useful to scum when they're looking for 2/14 players rather than 4/16.
1 claim: Ehh, I guess we don't give a roleblocker then, which sucks a bit. In which case it's janitor/assassin. Unless we feel like letting our hider just die N1.
0 claims: Roleblocker and... something. Someone should round up the arguments for Janitor vs. Assassin there.

[ekiM]

VOTE: Janitor
VOTE: Assassin

[ekiM]

Rolecop + Assassin seems pretty bad. They'd likely get both shots off at some point.

[ekiM]

Ellibereth, Kmd4390, My Milked Eek, and Papa Zito haven't claimed yet.Ellibereth is V/LA. We just hammered a role without waiting for all claims. Blehh.

[ekiM]

UNVOTE:

[ekiM]

We should wait for as many of Kmd4390, My Milked Eek, and Papa Zito as possible to claim. If no hiders, roleblocker. Otherwise assassin.

@mod: can you prod KMD and Papa Zito please? It has been at least 48 hours for the two of them.

Done. -Flay

[ekiM]

I have a meeting at 0900 GMT that should be done within an hour. So I can be online right up until deadline, I think.

[ekiM]

Remember that scum have to pick their roles in the next 24 hours. During that time it be best not to talk about suspicions.

[ekiM]

If at some point there's someone who's so so so scum that we would want to quicklynch them anyway then we might happen to do it fast enough to stop the janitor being online in time to use their ability... but I don't see why they would want to use is there. Not worth adjusting our play around at any rate.

Also, janitor can't sweep himself up, Herod.

[ekiM]

Also, janitor can't sweep himself up, Herod.

What makes you think that?

Also, janitor can't sweep himself up, Herod.

False. Reread the role.

Bleh, my bad.

I have classified the players based on the following:
- If you suggested something original during D0, you're in the town list
- If you kept a low profile, you're in the scum list. Basically, it narrows down to if your play appears like you were afraid to express opinions strongly and ruffle a few feathers.

Scum

3) ekiM

I don't get it. Among others.

- Anybody who agreed with a massclaim gets into the town list

Why?

18). VasudeVa
- He actually guessed one hider in his first post. (2 Trackers, 1 vig, 1 hider). But apparently he comes back 7 hours later to choose something different. That's odd - I can attribute old scum coaching new scum VV about how hider is a unlikely choice for scum.

Scum had 96 hours to talk before the thread was unlocked.

4). Ellibereth
- Plus points for actually making a scumhunting list

Why would it be good to telegraph to scum whom you do or don't suspect before they decide to give their powers to?

Not around at D0 deadline, and last to hider claim. Also, didn't hider claim in #350, even though he surely read #348 and #349 before posting. Prediction: still considering whether scum should fake claim hider in the QT.

Why would he post at all before making a decision in that case?

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DGB, Hoopla. What response were you expecting if DBG were believed by most? No vote switching? We were pretty damn close to deadline, what did you think was going to happen, precisely?

[ekiM]

Vote: Hoopla

.

[ekiM]

Hey, Hoopla, have you ever used appeals to emotion as scum?

[ekiM]

Ekim, do you generally lurk as town? As scum?

I generally lurk as either when I can't think of anything useful to say. If anything I'd say I lurk more as town, as I find it quite easy to fabricate townie-looking things to say as scum, and quite hard to do useful "behavioral" scumhunting as town, especially early on.

Also I've just attended a funeral and am working quit hard to finish my MSc so my time has been limited. I'm still going to try to put the time in and play, but I find it difficult to find something worth saying in a large game. Hopefully this will improve.

Do you have opinions on anyone, including the person you're voting (Hoopla)?

I have several town reads that I don't think it'd be useful to share.

I've been thinking about it and I don't think Hoopla's performance is coming from scum. I've been in a game with her with her as town and me as scum and she melted down when backed into a corner in a fairly similar way. That was at the end of a game, but it's a similar style of thing. So Hoopla acting like this as town isn't out of character. She said she's never used AtE as scum, and her meltdown here would be a pretty lame way to start. If I've been fooled then I'll feel a bit silly after the game, but I don't think I have.Therefore:
UNVOTE: Hoopla

In terms of current wagons and suspects.

I don't like the Hoopla wagon for the above reasons.
Vasudeva is playing... badly and drawing attention for it. Feels like such an easy target. I've seen similar things for him in another game. Bah, I hate wagons on players with terrible style generally, for their style. How can you evaluate whether it's coming from scum? I don't know. Feels more townie.
I think the possible slip on zoraster is decent and (rare D1) concrete evidence---he seems to assume she's town when explaining why she's scum.

VOTE: zoraster

[ekiM]

Hey Tajo, do you remember from the previous invitational where early on I said jokingly that probably one of the five lurkers was scum and got attacked hard for it? What was your opinion on that?

[ekiM]

I'd like everyone, if they haven't already, to express a preference between the three leading wagons. Go. (Hoopla>>>zoraster>VasudeVa)

zoraster >>> Hoopla = VV because I'm pretty sure the latter two are town. I think zoraster might be scum because:

DGB made her anti-town "gambit" without any real calculation

on whether it was helpful to the town, but she reasoned (correctly, it seems) that a "gambit" almost always comes across as pro-town, even when its substance is decidedly not.

The way this is phrased it seems like zoraster knows DGB to be town. Also, apart from stuff about DGB the main post he made today was the super wishy-washy 508, as others have point out.

However, the zoraster wagon doesn't look like it has any momentum. I don't want to lynch either Hoola or VV. Hero makes some ok points on KMD in 560. I'd definitely rather lynch possible lurkerscum than someone I think is town.

UNVOTE: zoraster
VOTE: KMD

People suspecting Herod because they think KMD is his buddy... it makes more sense to lynch KMD in that case and there is more possibility of a wagon there.

[ekiM]

Hmm, time for a re-read.

---

Hoopla's gambit was so transparently town that trying to casting doubt on it is suspect. Agree that Herodotus' response seems very townie and genuine. I didn't catch the crumb, myself.

[ekiM]

Has KMD actually claimed to have a tracker result or not?

[ekiM]

And if so shouldn't Elmo claim before we start discussing what our response to his various claim possibilities would be?

[ekiM]

If Elmo is scum and someone else is the vig people might be ruling themselves out of contention for being the vig by saying "I think Tajo must've been the scum kill", for example. Agree all that needs to be said on this has been said. KMD is town, we'll all know if Elmo is town tomorrow. Stop talking about it.

[ekiM]

I don't think KMDscum is bussing Elmoscum. I don't think KMDscum fabricated a result on Elmotown that happened to be true. So I'm rolling with "KMD is confirmed town". We'll have to wait for tomorrow for the truth on Elmo.

Bonus scumpoints to Ekim for joining the Zoro wagon for weak evidence and his reiteration of the case, this time with quotes, afterwards when he unvotes Zoro to vote Kmd (WTH, was there even more support for Kmd-wagon than Zoro-wagon then?) makes it seem more forced, and like he's more hung up on justifying his vote.

but overall Ekim's behavior with the focus of Zoro's alleged slip, and the focus on reexplaining his position thar.

I joined the zoro wagon because... that's the one I liked best. I thought the slip could be good evidence and I thought the Hoopla and VV wagons were garbage. I didn't have any amazing revelations to start a new wagon a few days before deadline.

I reiterated the evidence later because mith asked people to explain why they liked which of the popular wagons. I moved to KMD because the zoraster wagon had died, and Hero seemed to think the KMD one might have some life if people started joining it.

Not seeing how any of this is scummy.

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If Elmo had a big re-read to find new suspects last night I'd quite like to know who his other suspects are. Or was it just Amished?

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VOTE: DrippingGoofBall for going from "Hoopla is a townie who's an easy target" early D1 to "Hoopla is scum giving up" without any real change in what Hoopla was doing.

[ekiM]

Hoopla was making herself scarce in the face of a growing wagon. I considered that to be scum giving up.

She was already failing to contribute much, joking around with people suspecting her earlier. What changed? There were 7 votes on her when you said "Hoopla is the EASY LYNCH DU JOUR. This was decided last night in the QT." "[low activity is] a sign we're lynching a townie, and the scum don't want to rock the boat." There were 6 votes on her when you decided she was giving up in the face of a growing wagon.

Agree all that needs to be said on this has been said. KMD is town, we'll all know if Elmo is town tomorrow. Stop talking about it.

I don't think KMDscum is bussing Elmoscum. I don't think KMDscum fabricated a result on Elmotown that happened to be true. So I'm rolling with "KMD is confirmed town". We'll have to wait for tomorrow for the truth on Elmo.

o_O

Mmm, I was composing 487 when I saw what KMD had said and responded with 485.

If Elmo had a big re-read to find new suspects last night I'd quite like to know who his other suspects are. Or was it just Amished?

TRANSLATED:

pssst... elmo, level with me, who's on your short list for tonight so we know if we should block you? *wink*

Hmm, I see what you're saying. So Elmo should say nothing today, then?

[ekiM]

Really? You could see that statement coming from town? Let me give you a little more. ekiM just got done making a big deal about Elmo being sorted out through night actions. Presumedly, that means ekiM doesn't want to lynch elmo, but he doesn't think elmo is town either. So, how does questioning elmo about who the other suspects were (besides amished) help town-ekiM lynch scum today? I can't think of a good reason, but I can think of a very good reason for scum-ekiM to try to determine elmo's vig list.

Huh. Seems like you've misread me. I didn't ask who his other potential vig targets

were

(and he already gave a run down anyway). I asked whom he suspects

now

. That doesn't help me figure out whether to lynch Elmo (we aren't going to), but it might help my thinking on other players, whatever Elmo's alignment is.

I see now how revealing Elmotown's suspects could potentially help scum figure out if he's a threat to them tonight, but that's a needle for him to thread however he feels best. And if he's town are scum going to risk not blocking him, really?

Suffice to say thatI am being persuaded partly against my will of something akin to a too-scummy-to-be-scum-argument, except it's more like too-attention-grabbing to be scum. It's one thing in a small game (where there's little leeway for policy/VI/annoying playstyle lynches/misvigs), but in a Large game like this - one where scum-VV would know there's a Vig who'd like as not be perfectly happy to shoot someone who plays like that Day 1, Day 2 - I do think we would be seeing something less provocative, less 'full of buzzwords' to paraphrase Rhinox.

I think this is a pretty good point. It's hard to see scum imitating a VI when they know there's a vig. People saying stuff like this:

I feel he's being coached into this playstyle by more experienced scumpartners.

VV is scum because his motivation is not to scumhunt, but to make noise and bandwagon. I suspect he's being coached to do this

... should explain why this kind of coaching makes sense wrt Plum's point.

---

I still have a problem with DGB going from believing Hoopla wagon was scum driven with 7 votes, to believing Hoopla was scum giving up under pressure with 6 votes. No response. Nobody seems interested though.

I think this Ooba wagon has more legs. Rhinox's 929 is a good point, Zito's point is good. ISOing ooba his scumhunting seems pretty lazy.

UNVOTE: DGB
VOTE: ooba

I wonder though:

I'm starting to agree with ooba. I could see vas/rhinox as scumbuddies

unvote, vote ooba

What changed?

[ekiM]

SK's 941 seems decent.

[ekiM]

Opinions!

zoraster ~ ooba >>> DGB > Vasudeva,

Vasudeva

I think is town. I just don't believe that he'd be allowed to play like this if he had a scum team that knew there was a vig about. I haven't seen a convincing response to this argument yet. Seraphim, this is why I think VV is town.

ooba

's switch of opinion on VV is a solid point. See Rhinox #1000. Fluffy posts today.

zoraster

- 1037, 1038 - agree. Everything's terrible today.

DGB

Changed my mind on her now; quite a lot of DGB is saying makes sense to me, which is a good sign.

This game is almost unreadable for me right now, but I'll try to post something more insightful soon.

[ekiM]

Village idiots are prime vig targets. How would playing up his VI aspect seem like a way to avoid the vig? And I doubt a scum team just gives up on a player from the get-go in a game with roles like vig and tracker that can randomly blow things open.

[ekiM]

He happened not to get vigged. That doesn't mean that acting in a VI-way isn't labeling yourself prime vig-bait.

[ekiM]

UNVOTE: ooba
VOTE: zoraster

[ekiM]

KMD, why are you assuming zorascum would have to be "acting like" he didn't know about your claim? Maybe he

actually

didn't know about your claim, because he hasn't read the thread very carefully, because he doesn't care about figuring out who is scum.

I don't see how someone reads between #791 and #838 with any sort of interest without becoming aware that KMD was claiming tracker and is basically confirmed town. zoraster doesn't seem to be aware of this. In fact, in his "catch-up post" he didn't even mention the exonerating possibility that KMD was tracker in order to dismiss it. He seems totally oblivious to that whole episode. After all this...

Dgb is definitely on the right track.

Kmd: At this point, I think you may as well spell out what you're hinting at.

Kmd is claiming track on elmo to someone?

Elmo didn't even hint at suspicion of amished yesterday. I checked before voting.

DGB, Kmd: Kmd's result makes it

likely

Elmo is scum; I absolutely agree with that. His lack of Amished suspicion yesterday does not make that a certainty, though, and lynching him is still not the correct play.

Has KMD actually claimed to have a tracker result or not?

In fact, given that last bit, I don't think Elmo should even claim unless he

didn't

target Amished (in which case we do lynch him and then Vig Kmd if Elmo is innocent).

This is me not calling KMD a liar. Where do we go from here?

Mith, why are you playing up every option besides "KMD tracked Elmo directly to the kill".

Also, just for clarification, is KMD claiming to have tracked Elmo to Amished or is he claiming to have tracked to tajo?

Well, there, my question is answered. I'm going with the consensus that neither Elmo nor KMD is getting lynched today.

KMD is a tracker.

For clarification, elmo shot AMISHED, not tajo.

... he isn't even aware that he needs to talk about KMD's claim when discussing whether or not he's scum. Later he said...

So maybe it got lost in the shuffle, but are we completely leaving the elmo tajo thing alone? It seems like in our quest for information, this might be a good place to start, especially since we know they have a roleblocker.

I still am curious about the elmo tajo dynamic.

so he's "curious" about it... and yet he's not even aware of the basics of what the heck was going on there? He doesn't appear to have given the episode he's curious about more than a cursory once-over. How can that be?

[ekiM]

So zoraster disappeared once his wagon started to waver. Hasn't explained how he could have missed the KMD claim on re-read, hasn't provided anything that would actually be useful if he's town. Scum giving up.

Wait. The part where you say "I'm still not seeing how he as town doing a reread and posting thoughts on everyone could have possibly missed the Kmd claim" ... Why does he have to be scum if this is the case? You could replace the word "town" with "scum" and it still makes just as much sense. How could scum possibly miss that? How could town? The answer doesn't change either way.

You're missing the point. It looks like he hasn't re-read. He said he re-read. So he's lying. So his alignment is...

It's a bit less than eight hours to deadline and I think we're at L-1 on zoraster. This is the only lynch that's happening today so somebody be around to hammer. Herodotus?

I don't think mith's idea that zor might be scum faking is particularly likely. I think zor's scum who hasn't read the thread carefully because he doesn't care about figuring things out. I don't see this extra possibility I don't agree with makes mith scummy though. Why why would scummith need to invent a reason to vote for zoraster? There are enough good reasons to make that vote. The thought process in #1160 seems fine, and #1170.

DGB's attempt to piggyback on KMD's bad logic is bad... but I don't know how to evaluate whether DGB is being opportunistic here. Would DGBscum really expect that argument to achieve a lynch, if she recognized it as bad? It seems more likely she's genuinely misunderstanding what's going on with mith's thinking, which is null. And she was making sense to me earlier.

[ekiM]

I've got a null tell on Zoraster atm and that wagon gained momentium WAY too fast for my liking.

As far as zoraster, I'd be down for his lynch, skimming in general is anti-town, and from a normally analytical player...

Hmm. So what changed between getting a null "tell" and being anti-town in general? What's wrong with a wagon gaining momentum shortly before deadline?

Also a general lack of substantiation of opinions...

I've got a null tell on Zoraster atm

Mith is definitely not the lynch today, he's leaning town IMO, but I need a reread.

DGB is probably town imo.

[ekiM]

Reading...

[ekiM]

Due to unforeseen personal circumstances I'm not going to be in a position to play any forum Mafia for some time. I have requested replacement. I'm really sorry.