Thespival Mafia (Denouement)

[mathcam]

Wow, so much to say. I'll try not to cram it all in to one post.

First, meta-stuff about recent events:

I think a scumbag who didnt have the time to give it a decent shot bailed, and left it to someone who could fare better-hence Mathcam.BM

First of all, wouldn't a responsible townie who didn't have the time to give it a decent shot

also

want to leave it to someone else? While we're meta-ing about MeMe, from my experience there's nothing more important to her than the integrity of the game -- being replaced would take priority over putting an inadequate amount of time to do justice to the game. Running away from a fight isn't even remotely a possibility, and even if it

were

, she'd be more likely to do it as town than as scum -- I happen to know that getting lynched as town is much more painful to her than the same as scum.

Second, I don't think there's much for her to defend. She proposed a plan with a gaping wide hole in it, and made no bones about retracting it once the fatal flaw had been demonstrated to her. Unless the suggestion is that she intentionally came up with a majorly flawed plan and hoped that this pool of remarkably experienced players just wouldn't find it, I can't fathom what people can find scummy about it. In fact, she

repeatedly

asked for such a reveal ever since she proposed the plan, and it's unbelievably clear from her posts that she was genuinely excited about how strong this plan was. I don't think I've ever seen her get quite so giddy about a plan, in particular because she's not frequently much of a "plan" person -- she's got enough raw scum-finding talent to not need them very often. That she was so excited about it would've been a strong pointer she was town even if I didn't get to see her role PM (which, I might add, makes getting a read on a player very easy).

Okay, non-meta content coming next post.

Cam

[mathcam]

I'm reasonably sure that farside is the right lynch for today. There are Beep!Beep!'s reasons of it being unlikely that there are two docs and that they have the same exact same role PM, but these are only mildly convincing. (The latter especially since it was pointed out that the actual deck only had one picture, so that this fits the theme -- funny that Beep never acknowledged this point). I find much more compelling the fact that she didn't die last night (I know, I know, WIFOM, but with 3 kills?), her implication in Post post 1059 that she made her claimed night-choice based on what would make her least scummy as opposed to what would have been best for the town (to give credit, BM also noted this is 1067), and now her last post, which seems pretty Johnny-come-lately to me (trying to make sure to grab some of that sweet anti-MeMe action while it's still hot).

My other top suspects are Pooky and Ross:

For Pooky, he's been remarkably cavalier several times this game. First, there was the Mith/Pooky trap on day 1 which I think was fairly ill-conceived (though admittedly I wasn't at Thespival). Second, there's the 5 (now 6?) HD's -- not only was that a complete distraction and waste of time, it gave people the opportunity to say things they would not have to be held accountable for. And then there's his most recent lie to the town -- I'm not a big "Lynch all Liars" fanatic, but there's a reason that people cling to this rule, and this is one of those cases. It's not hard to come up with scenarios in which a mafia tracker could use such a ploy to his advantage, and it's hard to see how this could have helped the town. Was it really likely that a scum would have been dumb enough to fall into such a trap, especially since Pooky already admitted to lying about a plan already in the thread? Finally, there are several generally cavalier proposals he's made, about him collecting people's votes, etc. There are only two reasons that this hasn't propelled him over farside for me in terms of scumminess: First, I think I sincerely believe he would not have killed Tally as scum (though obviously his co-scum could have out-voted him), and second, I think this set of plays is more likely to come from a Jester than a scum. It just looks to me like a really blatant attempt at getting hit by the lynch-all-liars meta.

For Ross: I have three times in my notes, starting at the beginning of day 2, the exact phrase "Wow, Ross is soooo scum." (Okay, I confess, there were varying number of "o"s in each one). I have marked posts 494, 524, and 679 (though occasionally the number refers to a series of posts in that general vicinity). If I had been around at the start of day 2, I would have been pushing extremely hard for his lynch, and I was ready to jump into this game with a scathing attack on him. He hasn't, however, done much since then that I've found particularly scummy, so he's beginning to slip a little in the scumminess rankings.

I'm not sure what to think of Beep!Beep!. I thought MeMe's rebuttal against his "adjectives" was one of the best posts I've read in a long time (second in this game only to her post about "notes to self"...lol), but I'll concede that he had a point that MeMe this whole game seemed to lurk (or at least play quietly) until she was attacked, at which point she would spring into activity. Perhaps the thought that she would have to do this regularly for a little bit was what made her decide she wouldn't have enough time for the game any more.

I have tons more, but I'm not sure any of it's very pressing, so I'll just let it go as it seems necessary (kind of like a mathcam IV).

Cam

[mathcam]

PJ: Well, I hope you can get things worked out. I think you have the highest number of points marked "Good point!" in my notes.

MoS:
Smart enough to figure it out? Of course.

Did

figure it out? Apparently not.

The two, while related, are not the same.

To re-iterate, the only way I see that this can be interpreted as scummy is if you believe that not only did MeMe know about the flaw, but also believed that no one else would be able to find it. This position seems completely untenable to me.

Cam

[mathcam]

I don't think I buy farside's recent reveal. RW's point about it being opportunistic is pretty valid, but also:

I already have resigned myself to this lynch. I knew as soon as someone made the WIFOM comment about me not dead and Monkey being doctor that I was resigned to being lynched. So the fight against me is useless. I'm going out with who I think is scum since I'm town. That is what a person in my position should be doing.

This tone was a recurring theme in farside's posts around that time (start of day 2). Here's my question: Why would you have resigned yourself to the lynch before you had even claimed your full role? You made it seem like you had given all the information that you had, and that you were throwing your arms up in helplessness.

And earlier this page you write:

Didn't find it necessary to mention today but with PJ confused and people bring in a possible 2nd mafia group I thought it best to nip it in the bud.

This doesn't mesh with your above stance -- you thought your lynch was inevitable, and yet you didn't think it was necessary to mention it? If you really were a quack doc, I can't imagine you wouldn't have thought that the information you "revealed" would be of significant value to the town (e.g., figuring out the number of scum groups, who killed who, etc.) at the time of your first quote.

Last, your explanation for not revealing day 1 doesn't make much sense to me:

Didn't mention day 1 figuring I would get lynched saying I think I'm quack and Mith died because CB targeted him.

I might have bought "I couldn't be sure I was quack yet, since it might have been two scum groups against my one protect" or "I realized that I had a potentially strong pro-town ability that I didn't want scum to find out about," but "I was worried you would think it was scummy"? Seems like the sort of rationale that only makes sense if you're trying to retroactively come up with something, and hadn't actually spent time in that role in that position.

Cam

[mathcam]

Unvote Vote: Hasdgfas

Amen brother!

I'm confused by this post: Do you think he's scum and faking his role restriction, or scum with a pro-scum role restriction? Given the possibility of the latter, why would you choose to contribute to activating his power (which presumably would be getting to nightkill) by using the A-word?

Interesting that some people are asking hasd why he waited so long to come out with the info -- I was wondering why he bothered to come out at all. I tend to agree with farside that her lynch is nigh on inevitable, and it's not like his information provided more definite proof in either direction (because of the obvious possibility of a double kill -- though ckd makes a good point against the likelihood of that). It just seemed to have needlessly outed a power role. I can't really see why either a vig or a scum faking vig would come out in that position, so I'm not sure what to make of it.

Cam

[mathcam]

Hasdagas is not a vig, he gets a surprise power depending on his ability to get players to shout Amen.

Ah, right. I forgot about that. That makes the timing of his reveal a little more plausibly pro-town.

Cam

[mathcam]

PJ: I'm not fond of assignments in general, and I don't see much of a reason to oblige you in your requests. For the purposes of choosing night-kills and lynch targets, it's rather advantageous for scum to know how every person feels about every other person. If I have thoughts that are relevant to the current situation, or I think are valuable and would be wasted if I were to be night-killed, rest assured I will reveal them. In fact, that whole post reeks of scum trying to get a feel for who's likely to make a good lynch target for the day -- doubly so since you had started to come under pressure yesterday.

FOS: PJ

for that.

Finally, while I'm not sure what I make of the CKD/Has situation yet, I think it was clear that has' posts mean:

1) I followed someone to Pooky.
2) The person I followed was CKD.

Unless someone has Thesp-specific info about tracker roles, it sounds likely to me that he has a variant of the tracker/watcher role, and it was just easier to describe it as "tracker" than "watcher." I have a hard time believing that Has was dumb enough to mess up a faked night choice in only two posts. Surely a scum Has who had been planning this all night would have thought pretty carefully about such a plan.

And while I don't share Beep's devout confidence in has' pro-townedness, I agree that he should stick to his post restriction if possible. I'm not sure exactly what he could say in 100 words that would be

so

much more convincing than what he could in say in bursts of two words that would be worth the chance of sacrificing one of our remaining (and possibly the best) pro-town night abilities.

Cam

[mathcam]

Okay, I've been scouring over this has/CKD interchange for the past hour, and I've reached a conclusion: I think CKD is scum.

My argument: First, I think CKD definitely did target Pooky last night, based on this line:

what exactly did you do, track pooky or track me?

I don't think he would have phrased it in this way if he hadn't targeted Pooky at all. Also, and perhaps more important, is that he has not yet denied it.

Second, while it's possible he targeted Pooky with a pro-town role (I had him down in my notes as a possible RB earlier this game), I don't think this is the case either: Why would he attack Has based on Has' revelation if CKD had used a pro-town power on Pooky? He could have just said "Yeah, that was me. I used X on Pooky," and would have had no reason to insist that Has was scum. On the other hand, if CKD were scum, he could have seen his only option to be to attack Has and his result, implying that he thought his only defense was to claim he wasn't there at all. And if I were scum in CKD's position, I'd certainly try to help my buddies out by convincing Has to lose his night ability for the following night before I went. CKD did exactly this in post 1501.

Finally, I (ironically enough) agree with a point CKD made: Has has been holding his own the last couple of days, and so I don't think he'd sacrifice him standing to get ckd lynched unless we were in LYLO. The thing is, I don't think we are: While things are certainly bleak, there are almost certainly 2 scum groups left. Even if there were 3 in each one, we're a long way from LYLO (though admittedly we're also a long way from winning). In fact, the only reasonable setup I can see in which lynching CKD ends the game immediately is if there is 6 scum, divided as 5/1 between the two groups and where CKD is the group of one and the mafia

happened

to guess that CKD was the SK so they would know to pick him out today -- this is a miniscule risk that I'd be willing to take.

I'm feeling pretty good about this one.

Vote: CKD.

Cam

[mathcam]

p.s. Amen!

[mathcam]

PJ:

A) Okay, fair point.
B) There's a difference between the sort of strategical plans you could make during the day in order to extract information from other people (which I was accusing you of) and the sort of tactical plans (direct revealing of previously hidden information) which I was talking about with respect to has. If you're familiar with it, I liken it to the difference between strategy and tactics in chess. In any case, the latter requires a significant amount of case-checking to make sure the tactics are sound, and so I would expect as much from any reasonable player. This is less true of the former.
C) I think it's a little more subtle then you make it out to be -- it's not like you

know

them to be scum, or else you'd provide a watertight argument to us and we would lynch them. For that matter, you don't

know

most/all of us to be pro-town, so it's not like you can just decide whom to feel pressure from and whom not to. That said, I think your first point renders this argument moot.

1 (D?)) There have been respectively 2, 3, and 2 night kills. Even if we presume Farside was right about her quackness, that leaves a second kill on nights 2 and 3. To me, it's more reasonable to assume a doc-protect/role-block/double kill/whatever on night 1 than it is to assume we have a pro-town killer (in

addition

to Farside). I also think that nearly every game of this size I've played in has has at least that many scum groups.

2/E) Funny, I don't think my commentary on the game has been very lacking at all. I came in with 2 fairly detailed posts, have been posting fairly regularly since then and, if you ask me, I just nailed CKD, barring some gaping hole in my logic or stellar defense from CKD. Second, I gave you the reason! I'm certainly pro-analysis and fully see the merits of having people post substance -- for you to suggest otherwise is pretty uncharacteristically word-twisty from what I've seen of your play so far. You usually don't seem to go in for those cheap shots. What I

did

suggest is that it's not clear to me that there's much positive benefit in allowing one player to hand out assignments -- if the town needs this information, it will come out in the natural course of discussion, or it can be forced out at that point in the game. If it doesn't need the information, then the questions serve only as a distraction, allowing, for example, MGIA's last post in which he answers your question but ignores the (to me) more pressing issue of has and CKD.

Cam

[mathcam]

Oops, forgot some stuff:

Rest of response to 1)

How many scum per group do you think there are?

I have no idea -- I could give you a list of distributions I would find reasonable for a size of this game, but I'd have no guarantee that Thesp would have the same definition of reasonable as I do, nor would I have the extra information of exactly what pro-town roles (and/or anti-town roles) are out there to balanced the sizes.

But while I'm at it, this is a good example of the point I was trying to make earlier -- is it really beneficial to the town to know what mathcam thinks the size and shape of the scum groups to be? Or would it be more advantageous for scum to have this information from various townies so they know which arguments will work best come the endgame? To me, it seems like the latter, as I'd be impressed if you could determine whether or not I was scum by my response to that question, since if I were scum my automatic response would be to think about what my answer would be if I were a townie.

Do you think they are two separate mafias? A mafia group and a werewolf group? What are the factions?

Wouldn't two mafia have to be separate by the definition of the number two? (Sorry, that it was a bit snarky, but it was too funny to delete). But does it matter? In short, I don't know, and I would guess that people at Thespival would know better than I.

Cam

[mathcam]

Interesting that the bread-crumb was your first post after Pooky's gambit. If you were really a RB, wouldn't you have come forward, having no reason to suspect that Pooky was lying? On the other hand, it would certainly be easier for a mafia to say "Well, I bread-crumbed my RB role, but didn't want to come forward until the scum did," or something to that effect.

Let me also echo the question of why you targeted Tally -- I had her down (incorrectly, obviously) as a likely doc at that point through my read.

Finally, since you're apparently claiming that the first step in my argument is the faulty one, let me probe deeper -- Why didn't you deny that you targeted Pooky? Why did you phrase that one quote the way you did?

Cam

[mathcam]

Iammars: Yeah, that last line made no sense. If you're talking about CKD, why would the page number convince you he's telling the truth? I put forward an argument that the page number is actually evidence

against

the possibility he's telling the truth.

I seem to recall in Sanity Mafia, Thesp included a Mafia Tracker. Even if hasdgfas turns out to be right about CKD, at least for me, it will

not

confirm him as protown in my eyes. I have been thinking that it may be the case that he is a SK who could not kill on Night One due to his breaking his restriction. This would be another method to account for the nightkills, despite the fact that SK is clearly not one of the win conditions on the front post.p

I don't think it would confirm has for me either, but it would be pretty sadistic to make an SK earn his kill each night by sastisfying a posting restriction. I also doubt an SK would make this move in his situation -- he wasn't in significant danger of being lynched when he came out with his info, and has brought a lot of attention on himself by doing so. It's not like SK's can sacrifice a player for gain like the mafia can. A mafia tracker, on the other hand, is certainly plausible.

Cam

[mathcam]

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh. Never mind then.

Cam

[mathcam]

Claiming that it "might help scum who to nightkill" is 100% bullshit; yes, of course it might do that, but more importantly it lets townspeople get reads on other townspeople as well as scum. Every single opinion helps

both

the town and the scum make 'more informed decisions'; live with it. The difference is scum don't need to have information to kill somebody who is not in their group, whereas the town

does

.

I disagree. Some opinions help the mafia much more than the town. More to the point, opinions given in response to questions are more help to the asker than they are to anyone else -- presumably there was some reasoning behind the specific questions you asked and who you asked them of. You've made no attempt to explain these, or even mention if they were done randomly. You've made no attempt to convince anyone that your particular set of questions would be beneficial for the town to discuss, other than generic increased participation -- on the whole a very good thing, but we have plenty of legitimate things to discuss that make many of your requests a distraction at best. If you think there's a mathcam-BM or mathcam-Slay partnership, then make your case and the town can analyze and I can respond. If you're wondering if I have strong pro-town or pro-scum vibes from them, I've already told you that I would tell you if there were anything I found relevant and appropriate to share. It's not like I'm sitting on a treasure trove of scum partnerships that I'm keeping secret from everyone because I like prolonging the suspense.

mathcam is absolutely not justified in not giving his opinion.

I've given my opinion on several things, those things that have arisen in the natural context of discussion, or things that I think I have noticed that the town should know. I haven't given my opinion on some specific things that I haven't found particularly relevant and haven't been convinced of otherwise.

In fact, if he does not have his analyses done by the time I return from Arizona, I will make it my sworn duty to attack him at every turn in an attempt to lynch him.

You are obviously welcome to do this, but it's a pretty poor play to make a policy lynch rather than lynch a likely found scum whose gone in to hiding since he's been outed. On the other hand, I can understand the temptation to let meta-forces take over -- in addition to the aforementioned arguments, I have to admit at least a little that I'm not responding because you're being rather insulting. Maybe you don't care, as you're fond of pointing out, about any of this, but if you're really interested in finding scum, then maybe you should start caring about the fact that being a dick doesn't get us there any faster.

what is my agenda? What nefarious deed to you accuse me of plotting by asking people to give opinions?

Well, you're doing a pretty good job of distracting the conversation from CKD, what I consider to be our currently most pressing topic. What time you've spent on the CKD topic has been mostly aimed at deciding whether or not he actually bread-crumbed something, which seems clear to me (and I thought to you as well). I'm not saying I necessarily believe in a CKD-PJ scum pairing, and I'd probably put you as town if I had to make a call this very instant based on your seemingly genuine breakdown, but you act as if there's no way anyone could find anything you've ever done scummy. This is quite simply not the case.

If you would like confirmation that I have a precedent of doing this, look no further than my newbie games

So what?? If you want precedent for me not taking orders in games, I can give you that as well. I suspect that won't have any bearing on whether or not you find my refusal to participate as scummy.

CKD, please link me to past games where you have breadcrumbed your role, as well as any games where you falsely breadcrumbed as scum. I would like to compare them to this game.

Oh, come on. This is the most ridiculous request yet, as evidenced by the fact that you've got me to stick up for someone I think is likely scum. The other players in this game do not have even the slightest responsibility to satisfy your every informational whim. This is a game, not a job.

Cam

[mathcam]

My goodness. Can we let her read?

There's plenty of interesting stuff to talk about instead...

Cam

[mathcam]

Heh. Actually I wasn't. The Has/CKD dispute is pretty intricate in and of itself, and we can also talk about whether PJ is scummy for her recent behavior or whether or not I'm scummy for my recent behavior. Or if Beep's scum scores are reasonable. Or when Iammars is going to post some real content. Or whether we're at LYLO -- I don't think it's very likely, but others seem to think it might be.

Cam

[mathcam]

CKD:

Finally, since you're apparently claiming that the first step in my argument is the faulty one, let me probe deeper -- Why didn't you deny that you targeted Pooky? Why did you phrase that one quote the way you did?

Cam

[mathcam]

Here's what you said, ckd:

what exactly did you do, track pooky or track me?

all you have is two words and you can even get those straight...nice slip up fake claim

vote Has,

You did not deny having targeted Pooky. In fact, you seem to leave it deliberately vague as to whether or not it was possible that he did in fact track you before you committed to a claim one way or another. As I've mentioned before, I just don't see that first line being phrased like that coming from someone who had actually targeted someone else -- I can see it being a somewhat rhetorical question, but it just seems like the "track me" option wouldn't even be part of the equation from that point of view.

In fact, another thought just occurred to me -- if Has were a mafia tracker attempting to frame you, why wouldn't he have just revealed that you targeted RW last night, who also died? In fact, that seems pretty conclusive to me. If Has is trying to frame CKD, he's scum just making it up, as opposed to being a mafia tracker.

Cam

[mathcam]

Well, that's completely unproductive.

Unvote: CKD.

.

Yes, CKD, I even mentioned that I realized your question was rhetorical, but I still think it looks more like a post by someone who hasn't made up their mind what to do yet.

I'm also beginning to wonder if ckd's recent rant is motivated by the fact that I said that PJ's rant made him look more pro-town. If ckd does come up scum, I might have to retract that line on PJ.

Cam

[mathcam]

The number of posts in this game of the form "I cannot post now. I will post on day X" followed by a total lack of posts on day X from that person is simply astounding.

I still think ckd is scum, and I think his self-vote is just further confirmation.

Cam

[mathcam]

ckd/Beep: I unvoted because I don't want the day to end yet. Though I have no desire to see the day drag on endlessly, I at least want to wait until PJ gets back and reacts to the impending ckd lynch.

Holy: I've conceded that there was a minor ulterior motive in that I disliked the tone of PJ's posts. There was probably a hint of laziness in there somwhere as well. Other than that, I stand by my motive.

Cam

[mathcam]

5.) I obviously will not be pursuing mathcam on the basis that he did not answer my questions while I was gone, but he is now officially on my "makes Jelly very sad" list.

Oddly enough, I find this to be the most compelling reason to answer your questions so far. I will try to be accommodating in the future, as long as I don't feel like you're completely wasting my time. I do want to point out that while your play seems to be consistent (a la the Sanity Mafia link), I think it's odd that someone who relies so heavily on meta-analysis could be completely oblivious to a meta-fact of particular relevance to their own play -- namely, that being antagonistic typically does not have the desired consequences. Finally, perhaps this is more for a meta-discussion after the game, but treating what is unquestionably a game as a job is bound to have some negative side effects, in particular including increased frustration at those who treat it the way it was intended. (Admittedly, though, there are those who do not seem to even take it seriously enough for them to really even be considered as playing the game, let alone taking it as a job).

Beep, Mathcam has unvoted me....I dont believe his reason, I think that he doesnt want to assocaited with my lynch.

You don't believe my stated reason that I don't want you lynched yet because you think I don't want you lynched? Not only does that not make sense, but there's also no way I could disassociate myself from your lynch if I wanted to -- I've been pursuing it quite adamantly today.

PJ: First, I think posts 1689-1690 are fantastic -- while I might not agree with your philosophy on how to play the game, I can't deny that the amount of effort you put in is greatly beneficial to the town. I do, however, tend to worry about over-meta-ing. It seems to me that Thesp, knowing that most of the players in the game were also at Thespival, would have taken deliberate precautions to letting the setup be guessed at. This is pretty well evidenced by the fact that both ckd and Has are claiming roles that Thesp apparently tends not to include in his games. It seems likely to me that at least one of them is telling the truth, the alternative being that they happened to be on opposite (the same??) scum groups that just happened to end up in an amusingly complicated lie on both sides.

I think I'm pretty decided on ckd. Maybe I've just fallen into a self-fulfilling prophecy with ckd's posts, but every time he posts makes me more confident that he's scum. I tried reading from the start of the day through now envisioning has as scum and ckd as town, and vice-versa, and it just seems that almost every sentence of ckd's is slightly off from what I think he would have written if he were telling the truth. I have no doubt that his bread-crumb was deliberate, but I don't see that as particularly strong evidence in his favor. I think it's more likely that a pro-town ckd would have believed Pooky and revealed he was one of the two targeters, whereas a mafia would rather take his chances staying quiet and bread-crumbing in case it was necessary to come up with a cover story later.

Cam

p.s. Iammars: . You have got to get your head in the game. I think you owe use at least a re-read of the day, if not the whole game.

[mathcam]

Vote: ckd.

Cam

[mathcam]

I don't think that makes any sense whatsoever. I've been voting ckd for the majority of the day now, and only briefly took my vote off because I didn't want the day to end without hearing again from some people who hadn't posted in a while.

What "opportunity" do you think has recently arisen that I'm taking advantage of? The fact that people seem to be being swayed away from the ckd lynch recently?

The more I think about it the more that post boggles my mind. If ckd weren't so appealing as a lynch...

Cam

[mathcam]

Making use of information that incriminates a player is not opportunism, especially when backed up by several in-depth posts supporting my vote. And if you thought my first vote was opportunistic, why didn't you mention it then?

And no, I can't explain in more depth. The entire essence of that post is "I can't explain why, but all of ckd's posts seem scummy to me." For example, PJ's town-disparanging feels pro-town, and CKD's town-disparaging feels like desperate scum maneuvering, but I'm not sure I could articulate the difference very clearly.

Regardless, I'm shocked that you would find any of this voteworthy given the fact that there is a very high probability that one of has/ckd is scum. This looks like a deliberate distraction to me.

Cam

[mathcam]

I'm still leaning toward Has not breaking his restriction, especially now that there's 3 days left until deadline -- even if he's scum, I doubt he'd say anything so dumb that would make him the likely lynch for the day

PJ: I disagree with your stance on CKD not denying the Pooky target, I think the natural response for ckd in that position, if he were telling the truth, is so clearly to post that he did not target Pooky that the lack of such a statement is (to me) a very strong statement that he in fact did, or at least that he hadn't yet made up his mind whether or not he was going to deny it.

I also don't think "Why did you block on night 1?" is a particularly strong question. Save for vigs, it's not uncommon in my experience for players to use any role they get on night 1, not realizing (or perhaps despite realizing) that such a play is not optimal strategy. On the other hand, ckd is experienced enough to know better, so maybe there's some merit to this point after all.

I'm not ignoring the possibility that has is scum. I think it's significantly more likely, given the way that the day unfolded, that ckd is scum than has is. And, of course, if they're both scum, then we're at least not mislynching.

Finally, I agree that there should be no vote-stealing.

Cam

[mathcam]

Deadline: Sunday, March 30 at 2pm Central US Time.

[mathcam]

I still want to know more from MoS or Iammars if the time permits.

Amen!

Cam

[mathcam]

I

would

formally ask for the scum to kill me tonight if not for the assurity that somebody will then accuse me of trying to appeal to pity/WIFOM/whatnot.

No way. Then Beep and I are the only actively posting players. How fun would that be?

If CKD is town, mathcam and PJ must die.

Because my vote wasn't as pendulum-y as yours was today? Or because I made actual points against ckd? Or are you just trying to set up a lynch for tomorrow?

Major FOS: Beep

.

Cam

[mathcam]

Only scum is ever really sure.

If it's my sureness (which I don't think is actually all that sure) that you're opposed to, then why did your comment only apply in the case that ckd was town? And how did PJ get lumped in -- she seems far less confident in the vote than I do.

needs posters

Here are some funny ones: http://www.despair.com/viewall.html

Regardless, you should try to stay on topic.

[mathcam]

If you thought he was scum before, then you thought he was capable of making a somewhat convincing rant about how idiotic the town was and bemoaning his current position. If you could believe that, you should be able to believe he can post a fake bah post.

Cam

[mathcam]

If you could believe that, you should be able to believe he can post a fake bah post.

CKD sounds sincere. You do not.

If you thought his rant was sincere, why did you vote for him?

Cam

[mathcam]

4) This way is much more exciting to try to work out.

I think PJ has a good point that it might have been a guaranteed game-winner for a MGIA scum team had MoS not been killed, but I haven't really thought this through yet. I need to spend some time placing myself in other people's positions.

Does anyone know what a jester's nemesis is? The fact that the card was hand-written seems to imply to me that a lot of the metas being argued yesterday get thrown out the window.

I agree with not voting.

Cam

[mathcam]

PJ: Let me make sure I understand your argument. If the scum group was MGIA and three others (CKD, Mos, and unknown), then last night they may have decided to play for the immediate win and use MGIA's ability. Waking up with 8 alive and none of the scum dying would be a win since they'd control 4 out of the 8 votes, meaning that they'd have (essentially) full control over the lynch for that day, and hence a pretty clear victory. Right?

One issue: Given how scummy this makes MGIA look, they'd have to be confident that there would be two kills again tonight. Unless they have control over both kills, they'd have to be somewhat foolish to risk MGIA's lynch to the chance that there wouldn't be a second kill, and to the whims of an unknown killer who had a 1/3 chance of killing scum. Or maybe this isn't an issue, since even if there wasn't a second kill last night, they'd control 4 out of 9 votes, a pretty significant advantage when all they have to do is make one good kill. Hm.

On a completely separate note:

Has, any reason why you don't want to tell us immediately?

This question set off my scumdar something fierce. Has obviously has a reason, whether it be because the information will be more useful later or that he's scum and hasn't though of the answer yet, or else he would have told us. Mizzy's question reeked of scum wondering whether or not she had been tracked/investigated/whatevered last night. In any case, my instincts tell me to give Has the benefit of the doubt until it becomes necessary to do otherwise. If he doesn't come up with something satisfactory, we can always insist that he breaks his posting restriction.

Cam

[mathcam]

This question set off my scumdar something fierce. Has obviously has a reason, whether it be because the information will be more useful later or that he's scum and hasn't though of the answer yet, or else he would have told us. Mizzy's question reeked of scum wondering whether or not she had been tracked/investigated/whatevered last night. In any case, my instincts tell me to give Has the benefit of the doubt until it becomes necessary to do otherwise. If he doesn't come up with something satisfactory, we can always insist that he breaks his posting restriction.

Wait, so trying to get more information is scummy? Asking why someone won't share information is a bad thing? Last I checked, sharing information is pro-town and hiding information is anti-town. Not to mention, I didn't attack him at all, I was trying to get some conversation started.

Wow. This response elevates the original suspicion to a major

FOS: Mizzy.

You completely ignored the point of my suspicion in favor of defending against inane accusations that were never made. How you got from "The way Mizzy asked for that information seems scummy to me" to "mathcam thinks that the town having information is bad" is beyond me. To be absolutely clear, I was not accusing you of attacking him, or even necessarily arguing that he should keep his information secret -- I was arguing that your question reeked of a fake nonchalance when trying to extract that information, as if you were scum worried that you had got caught killing someone last night.

Cam

[mathcam]

Sorry, clicked submit a little too early:

BEEP: Man, it must have taken forever to size and color those z's the way you wanted to. Maybe you could devote that greater than or equal to that much time to sharing your thoughts on who's scummiest? Look at this way -- if you can convince MGIA to listen to your choice of targets, you have double the strength of your vote from yesterday!

Current thoughts on MGIA: My gut says that MGIA would't have made this move as pro-town without serious discussion beforehand. Now I haven't played a ton of games with MGIA, but my mental profile of him is as a solid and deliberate player, relying more on his scum-finding abilities than on unorthodox gambits (not that there's typically anything particular unorthodox about using one's role, but when the town has already agreed in thread that it would be best not to, I think it qualifies). On the other hand, I could certainly believe that a scum MGIA would be willing to take a chance at an immediate victory by using his role, figuring that even in the worst case scenario it wouldn't be an impossibly hard task to defend his actions. Again, this is just a gut reaction, so I think I need to re-read looking for MoS and CKD links.

Cam

[mathcam]

Current thoughts on MGIA: My gut says that MGIA would't have made this move as pro-town without serious discussion beforehand. Now I haven't played a ton of games with MGIA, but my mental profile of him is as a solid and deliberate player, relying more on his scum-finding abilities than on unorthodox gambits (not that there's typically anything particular unorthodox about using one's role, but when the town has already agreed in thread that it would be best not to, I think it qualifies).

On the other hand

, I could certainly believe that a scum MGIA would be willing to take a chance at an immediate victory by using his role, figuring that even in the worst case scenario it wouldn't be an impossibly hard task to defend his actions. Again, this is just a gut reaction, so I think I need to re-read looking for MoS and CKD links.

How does "on the other hand" fit in? It seems that on both hands you're holding, you are leaning towards MGIA-scum.

The "on the other hand" was not meant to be the start of a counter-point, it was meant to start the discussion on the alternative case that MGIA was scum instead of town. They were both parts of the same argument that MGIA is likely to be scum from this point of view.

I already said how I thought was scummy but I can't get anything right, right?

Oh, come on. We've all been wrong before. This seems like a little scummy in terms of over-the-top self-beratement. If you're town, now's your chance to redeem yourself.

[mathcam]

Wow! Exciting levels of participation in the last 3 posts.

Beep: I think there's some pretty good info there, even if I find the numerical assignments somewhat arbitrary. How come only 6 people got rankings, and one of them is dead?

Iammars: I'm not sure I agree on your point against MGIA. If MGIA is town and thought his plan of using his role was of significant tactical advantage against scum, then letting everyone know about it beforehand probably would have just ended with him being night-killed. (Although the fact that he didn't actually make this argument yet today makes it rather unlikely that this was his thinking.)

Cam

[mathcam]

I'm actually finding PJ rather scummy in this exchange. Basically I'm surprised that PJ is bothering trying to nit-pick at what is clearly a very arbitrary scoring mechanism and based on Beep's rather specific theories on how to find scum. I agree with Beep's last post -- given that no one really taking Beep's analysis to heart, and that it doesn't even seem like she's attempting to use it as a tool, why spend so much time dissecting it? But more to the point, I

really

can't understand the point of view that Beep's been doctoring her scores in a nefarious scum scheme, mostly for the exact same reason that she's not actually convincing anyone.

It's also not clear that PJ has any interest in whether or not PJ is interested in what BEEP has to offer instead of for the purposes of taking cheap shots at obvious weak points in the scoring system. I haven't spend nearly as much time as PJ poring over Beep's last few posts, and yet I noticed one of PJ's questions that Beep had already answered:

Do you believe that every wagon has a scum on it? Your analysis certainly seems to assume as much.

Everything stems from my belief that you'll almost never have a wagon without scum.

In short, my opinion of PJ in the last few posts is townily over-defensive and paranoid at best, and scummily over-defensive and taking advantage of an easy lynch target at worst. The fact that PJ isn't actually pushing for a Beep lynch is probably the tie-breaker, perhaps implying that the over-defensive and paranoid option is actually closer to the truth.

Not that I'm at liberty to dictate the discussion topics, but I'm pretty done with the discussion of Beep's scoring. Much more interesting to me is MGIA's thoughts since his last post and what he's leaning toward doing with his pair of votes today. (Also, PJ's addressed some of these issues since I started writing this).

Has: Is there anything we can do to make your information more useful? Why was the fact that you got a night action surprising?

Cam

[mathcam]

To clarify: The number of amens today has an effect on whether or not your information from last night is relevant?

I'm game.

Amen!

Cam

[mathcam]

Ah, I think I misunderstood -- your response of "number amens" was in response to "Why surprised?" and not "What can we do?", right?

Looks like I need to go amen-counting.

Cam

[mathcam]

Apparently you yourself thinks there's some "pretty good info" in Beep! Beep! analysis; I am showing that it is very much not. Anybody can whip up a voting analysis. I've done it as town and as scum.

I'll admit that it was mostly a throw-away phrase, but it is true that having that much voting information in one place is useful (albeit, I hadn't checked it for accuracy at that point).

And I agree -- this is my first game with you, and I'm slowly getting accustomed to your unique playstyle.

Where's your vote, Holy? Come on, vote to lynch me. Show us that you're scum as my model predicts.

There's one out of 5 votes on you, Beep. This last-ditch appeal to sympathy is even less believable than ckd's.

Here's a theory whose plausibility I haven't entirely thought through yet: MGIA and Beep are scum together, they thought that Beep was a likely lynch target for the day, and so MGIA stole her vote as a pretty definitive distancing play, particularly distancing given how blatant Beep has been about being upset with her lack of vote. It would certainly be a compelling defense for MGIA if he used Beep's own vote to get her lynched and she turned up as scum.

Cam

[mathcam]

Hey mathcam I hope you are getting accustomed to my unique playstyle, too.

I'm not sure that's possible...

Cam

[mathcam]

Harumph, why I am still alive?

Because there's not a general consensus that you're scum?

Come on people, you all want to see PJ being dead wrong, don't you? The faster you lynch me the faster it's going to happen!

I have to admit that the two possible outcomes being that we either get rid of scum or get to see PJ being dead wrong has some appeal.

I would have voted myself already if I had a vote.

Ah, then you're arguing that MGIA stealing your vote was a

good

thing. Interesting.

Well, this was a pretty worthless post -- I really think we need to hear from MGIA again.

Cam

[mathcam]

It seems to me that there's ample room between not posting at all and dropping the hammer on someone.

Cam

[mathcam]

The fact that 6 out of the 8 remaining players (the exceptions being our two lurkers Iammars and MGIA) have expressed an interest in lynching Beep is somewhat worrying in and of itself.

Actually, a quick check reveals Iammars is the only player to have never make an attack on Beep, though MGIA's was early on and pretty insubstantial. Hm.

Cam

[mathcam]

I have been wondering off-hand about something that I would like people's opinions on (and this is largely influenced by the notion of Beep! Beep! being scum). Do people think the scum-group was told in advance that Pooky was the Jester?

I'm confused -- Wouldn't this be an automatic defeat for the jester? He/she would be subject to the whims of whether or not the mafia was willing to be co-victors, which would seem to be 100% of the time "no," at least if I were scum.

I fucking knew it...DGB and Beep Beep are the same person...god everything makes so much sense now. No wonder I dont understand anything you are saying....which is funny, because i said the exact samething in another game about DGB today....

I ran across this line again in reading through CKD's posts again. This too seems a little over-the-top. Given that we already know CKD was prone to faking dramatic positions (the self-vote, the imploring pleas, the fake bah post, etc.), it would certainly fit the pattern for CKD to have already known that Beep was DGB and have taken this opportunity to feign a dramatic surprise at this revelation.

I think I'm sold.

Vote: Beep! Beep!

.

Cam

[mathcam]

excellent question

Really? Seemed to me like it was more designed to satisfy Beep's curiosity than provide useful information we can use. In fact, this is exactly the kind of question I was referring to when arguing with PJ that not all revealed information is beneficial to the town. For this particular question, it seems like the mafia gains more by knowing the answer to this (for the purposes of making a kill overnight, assuming PJ isn't scum) than the town does (catching a tell in PJ, or more likely just being able to point and laugh after the game if he's wrong).

Cam

[mathcam]

Are you setting up for PJ to refuse to answer my question? If so, why?

If I've learned anything about PJ's playstyle, it's that there's essentially nothing I could say that would stop PJ from responding to your question. Your "why" question is disingenuous at best -- I explained in the exact post that you're responding to why I didn't think the question should be answered. You're trying to establish a (completely implausible, IMO) mathcam-PJ scum pairing because those are the two people you've somehow decided are scum.

If she is scum then the scum gain nothing by me answering

The motive of the asker seems irrelevant to me (though the asking seems to shed light on that motive) -- the scum gains the same information regardless of who asked it.

This is one of those canned responses to something that I hate seeing. If someone doesn't like a question or whatever, they call say, "Oh don't say that because it gives the scum information!" and 9 times out of 10, it's information the scum could figure out on their own and probably already have.

First of all, I don't think this response is canned at all -- it actually seemed rather controversial when I made it yester(game)day. And even if this were true, this would likely be that 1 time in 10. I suspect that the mafia would be delighted to know exactly who a pro-town PJ would go after tomorrow if a pro-town Beep were lynched, and don't think it's information they could possibly already have or figure out.

[mathcam]

Agreed on MGIA, both in terms of meaningful participation and in terms of setting up stealing PJ's vote tomorrow. It is striking that given the controversy, he hasn't said that he won't use his ability again tonight -- makes me wonder if he thinks there won't be any more days.

Beep: Can you explain any more why you now think I'm scum? The best I could find was this:

I fucking knew it...DGB and Beep Beep are the same person...god everything makes so much sense now. No wonder I dont understand anything you are saying....which is funny, because i said the exact samething in another game about DGB today....

I ran across this line again in reading through CKD's posts again. This too seems a little over-the-top. Given that we already know CKD was prone to faking dramatic positions (the self-vote, the imploring pleas, the fake bah post, etc.), it would certainly fit the pattern for CKD to have already known that Beep was DGB and have taken this opportunity to feign a dramatic surprise at this revelation. Unless you're suggesting that

that

itself was an elaborate scheme to frame you, then I'm not sure what brought upon the ckd-fooling-you discussion.

Cam

I think I'm sold.

Vote: Beep! Beep!

.

Cam

What you say makes no sense, cam.

I was scum in Heroes Smalltown and he was town. You were in that game, too, mathcam. So you ought to know.

We were 3 scum left, and there were 4 townies. CKD really had no chance, my scumbuddy Adele framed him in such a way that we had to either lynch CKD, or lynch Adele. The town was really outscummed, but I could sense his frustration and despair, I actually felt terrible playing with his emotion like that, in a way, for me, it was a bitter victory because I didn't enjoy making CKD miserable. He was right, he was telling the truth, but there we were framing him on purpose.

So in Thespival yesterday, I saw him pull out the same drama. So it got me thinking that maybe both hasdagas (whom I firmly believe to be town) and CKD might be town. And then PJ made this long post, second guessing the mod and all, and it wasn't so clear that CKD was lying scum, this time.

Ah well, CKD and I are now even. I fooled him, and now he fooled me. I shall have no mercy on him should he wish to pull my heartstrings ever again.

mathcam I know you are scum in this game. Just confess. It's not the type of victory that will give you satisfaction. You don't want to make me cry do you?

I don't understand this at all. The reason I gave in that post, and indeed one of the predominant reasons I'm voting for you right now, is because of a post that ckd made that seemed to me to be a fake surprise at discovering your true identity. It seems like all you're defending is why you were a sucker for (or pretended to be a sucker for) CKD's overacting.

Cam

[mathcam]

Congrats, Mizzy! Just make sure you keep your priorities straight.

[mathcam]

I'm still happy with my vote. While I'm not sure I can say I have a fantastic read on Beep one way or the other, I

really

feel like I have a read on CKD faking that post about Beep being DGB.

If I had a second choice, it would be MGIA.

Cam

[mathcam]

Question: mathcam, did MeMe give you her notes for the game?

Nope.

I did not like – and still do not like – mathcam's refusal to answer my questions. I definitely feel that if CKD and MoS had answered them (at the very least) we would have quite a bit more information to go off of today.

Any lack of information from CKD and MoS comes from the fact that they did not participate adequately, not that they did not answer your specific questions. I'm certainly against inadequate participation, but I was opposed to one person being able to dictate what questions were answered.

He claims to be worried about information the scum might possibly use against the town, while seemingly not considering the benefits the town gets by forcing scum to give positions, defend them, and try to remain consistent with themselves while showing a clear thought process.

If we just insist that people participate, without making specific demands on what questions they answer, then we get the benefit of seeing what positions they choose to take,

in addition

to their methods of giving them, defending them, etc.

mathcam also mistakes me as a "her" a couple times. *sigh*

I've caught this many more times than I've let it go through...something about your avatar. My apologies, though. I'll try to be more careful.

However, mathcam's reluctance to see any lynch but me today is very scummy.

This is a pretty gross misrepresentation of my stance today. Early today I was defending you against PJ and trying to convince you not to give up on the game altogether (though on that note, this reread reminded me how contrived some of those early resignatory posts looked). I even made part of a case against PJ. In any case, I think it's fair to say that MGIA was my top target at that point. Most recently, I've just written that MGIA would be my second choice for a target today.

For that matter, reluctance to lynch outside of one's top choice for the today is just sensible. There's presumably some reason that they were the number one choice.

Cam

[mathcam]

Least cool post ever, MGIA. I would have expected more from you.

I have to think if there's any way a scum MGIA would make a post like that. If nothing else, that attitude certainly explains the use of this role last night.

Iammars: WHERE ARE YOU?

Cam

[mathcam]

Let me just take a wild stab at this and guess it was a PJ post.

MGIA: Okay, I take back my harsh words, but I do think you're being a little thin-skinned about it. PJ's been calling us idiots/rocks/etc for at least three game days now, and that's nothing compared to what he's hurled at Beep.

Cam

[mathcam]

It seems safe to assume that there will be no replacement for Iammars by the end of the day (reasonable since even if one magically appeared, they would hardly have time to catch up before tomorrow, and we've already had our maximum one deadline extension for the day). From this point of view, Iammars is certainly not going to be any help today, and might not be for the rest of the game. I don't see him as particularly scummy, but that's primarily since he's stayed pretty quiet and unhelpful -- in fact, the only thing I have in my notes on him is a seemingly unreasonable attachment to MeMe. The pros for lynching Iammars are the above point that he's not contributing and that it saves Thesp from finding a replacement. The cons (for me, at least) are that we ignore the two scummiest players for another day. It's also possible that Iammars will die overnight anyway, though the mafia has admittedly not been very helpful about killing people that request it. All in all, this Iammars bandwagon just seems too convenient.

Cam

[mathcam]

I am vanilla, and I'm surprised that you still think I'm scum. There's actually a pretty hard-to-defend-against case that I'm mafia, what with my staunch support of has and my reluctance to lynch Iammars -- but the SK? I don't see how you can believe that. On another note, notice the lack of self-beratement about being horrifically wrong on at least one account, Beep -- it happens.

I'm a little tied up in RL, but I should be active again pretty soon.

Cam

[mathcam]

I am vanilla, and I'm surprised that you still think I'm scum. There's actually a pretty hard-to-defend-against case that I'm mafia, what with my staunch support of has and my reluctance to lynch Iammars -- but the SK? I don't see how you can believe that. On another note, notice the lack of self-beratement about being horrifically wrong on at least one account, Beep -- it happens.
Cam

Wait.., believe what?

Believe that I'm the SK.

Re-reading yesterday situation, a support for has or a reluctance lynch against Iammars not exactly proves you're Vanilla or SK, Cam.

This post is confusing to me. I was saying that both of these things are more likely to be mafia tells than SK tells (or townie tells, for that matter). Since apparently BeepBeep and I both agree there's likely only an SK left, I found it odd that she would still think I was scum. In any case, it's probably not my optimal strategy to spend time

too

much time arguing that I'm probably mafia, so I'll stop with this train of thought.

Other thoughts: It looks like we probably have two days left to find scum, assuming we have just the one kill each night. Both my principal targets from yesterday are still alive, though my suspicion of Beep has diminished somewhat because she's unlikely to be co-scum with CKD any more, which was my biggest argument. This leaves Flameaxe...OH. Important realization. If Flameaxe is scum, he wins after a wrong lynch, since even if we lynch a town Beep, he can recruit a second vote overnight.

For that matter, if Flameaxe isn't scum, why isn't he dead by now? Surely scum would not want to not be in the situation where he/she could be lynched by Flameaxe and other person -- too risky.

I'm starting to be convinced Flameaxe is the play-o'-the-day,but I'm not sure yet. It's crucial that no one vote yet, since if he's scum, he could finish off a lynch just by himself.

Cam

[mathcam]

Because that would be so blatantly scummy that you'd be lynched right away?

Cam

[mathcam]

Certainly you being a town is a possibility. I'm not even saying I find it that unlikely.

Recruiting last night would have been an all-or-nothing gambit for you. If either you, Beep, or your target would have been killed overnight, you would have been exposed as scum If not, you win. It's also possible that you hadn't thought of this plan -- the fact that you didn't mention this in your previous post is evidence of this possibility.

Here's another thought: If scum is not Flameaxe or Beep, then wouldn't there have been an easy choice for scum to kill Flameaxe? It eliminates the threat of a super-voter and would provide some pretty incriminating evidence against Beep.

There's just something that doesn't add up about this scenario.

Cam

[mathcam]

Not allowed to reveal I guess.. (at least according the Wiki).

If you're referring to this:

In one variation of the Mason role, the Masons cannot reveal that they are Masons to the town through roleclaiming.

Then note the "in one variation" bit. I'm not sure if Thesp is using this variation, but I don't think I've ever seen it in use before.

Can anyone else comment on my Flameaxe comments? To sum up, it seems likely to me that Flame's alivedness is somewhat strong evidence that either Beep or Flame is scum.

Cam

[mathcam]

I gave you a specific question to respond to! Why not respond?

Anyone?

Cam

[mathcam]

So you disagree that there's likely only one scum left?

Cam

[mathcam]

If Flame is scum, I don't think he would miss the chance to recruit last night. A third recruit would benefit a Cult-scum, resulting his vote today (if today's exist) would means a hammer at the same time. I can't see why a scum would miss that kind of chance, unless he's considering there's still a mafia alive today and prefer a clean-look by not recruiting... Question Well.., a recruit or a no recruit from Flame last night, the more I think about it was kind of WIFOMy. What I know, missing last night recruit was careless as scum, don't you think?

I think I explained my take on this earlier -- if Flame was scum and recruited last night, that meant that three of the 7 people alive through the night would have been Cult of the Couch. If the other scum group killed any of the three, a 50/50 shot, Flame would no longer have voting majority, and worse, it would be quite clear that he was scum (acting to gain majority control of the vote, after we had quite clearly admonished MGIA for using his ability the night before). So would Flame take a 50/50 shot at immediately winning or losing the game? I think not, since all he has to do is survive today to win, which is like a 4/5 shot, possibly higher considering that some of us (namely, me) look scummier than he does.

For that matter, it's possible that if Flameaxe

did

target someone who got simultaneously killed, that the person's status would not be changed to cult. So if he targeted Has or PJ, we might not even know about it.

I'm not even that convinced Flame is scum -- but it's certainly plausible, and I

know

we have to lynch him today if he is scum. He's the only person that couldn't wait tomorrow for us to lynch. If Beep still feels like I'm the surefire scum target tomorrow, then she'll have the satisfaction of voting me herself once she gets her vote back.

Cam

[mathcam]

How exactly did you guys come up with me being scum? Pure lack of evidence?

Everyone knows that's an obvious scumtell.

Cam

[mathcam]

I know you can't believe that, but I don't care at this point. You guys are going to do what you want, when you want, and I feel like the only thing I can do is warn you and let you screw yourselves.

Why so defeatist? I personally believe that the last scum is either Beep or Flameaxe. Based on scumminess alone, I'd probably go with Beep, but for tactical reasons Flameaxe has to be the first to go. Ultimately, we'll probably need to hear a lot more from Flameaxe, since most likely he will be two out of the three votes on the lynching bandwagon, assuming I am unable to convince Mizzy and Holy to seeing my point of view.

Incidentally, I know there's a lot of WIFOM here, but wouldn't it be a strange ploy for me as scum to go after the hardest person it is for me to get lynched? I can only get Flameaxe lynched if every non-Flameaxe player with a vote supports me, and even then, I become an almost immediate target for the final day if I'm wrong.

Cam

[mathcam]

Incidentally, I know there's a lot of WIFOM here, but wouldn't it be a strange ploy for me as scum to go after the hardest person it is for me to get lynched? I can only get Flameaxe lynched if every non-Flameaxe player with a vote supports me, and even then, I become an almost immediate target for the final day if I'm wrong.

If we discover this, it means you're town. If you have to point it out, it means you're scum.

Oh please. If I don't point it out, you'll just point out how weak my argument is because of WIFOM. Just because I see the minor flaws in my own argument doesn't make it any less valid.

I will be the first to say, I don't understand the whole "It's Flame or BB! Flame must die first!" thing. Given there is one anti-town player left, if it was BB, why would I still be alive? Not having a vote seems to be a rather uncool thing to have (or not have I guess) for someone trying to end the game with a big fat W.

I explained my take on this already (I seem to be saying this a lot). I think that BEEP killing you would draw too much suspicion on herself. I suspect that if anyone

other

than Beep (or you) were scum, you would be dead precisely because of the fact that it would immediately implicate Beep, which would be good for the actual scum. That logic dictates that you be the first lynch is just sort of unfortunate for you (or, actually, unfortunate for me, since no one seems to buying this argument).

In any case, it's clear that I have to abandon this plan, given that Flame is probably unlikely to concede to a self-vote. I'll just have to hope he's not scum. If Holy or Mizzy is scum, I'll have to confess to being completely blind to their scumminess this game.

Vote: BeepBeep.

Cam

[mathcam]

For all we know, Mith's mason buddy could already be dead.

Or alive and scum. You sure you're not the mason, Beep? For that matter, given that you think (or claim to think) that I'm scum, how are you so sure that I'm not a scum mason?

Cam

[mathcam]

Mith is a better player than to partially expose his mason partner with bad play on day 1 by deliberately avoiding voting him/her. But you're right in your conclusion that I'm no mason.

Cam

[mathcam]

Well, that was unexpected.

I'm pretty sure Beep is not Cult. I think Flame's role is exactly as the first post says. Beep herself is not part of the cult is, but (in a sense) her vote is. That said, your conclusion is what I've been preaching all day -- that an evil cult scenario puts us awfully close to Lylo (it's only the number of votes that count, regardless of whether Beep herself has been converted).

That said, I'm a little wary of the fact that you needed such an elaborate scenario to justify that vote. Hm.

Cam

[mathcam]

Well, it looks like we have three plausible scenarios:

1) Mizzy and I join up with Holy to lynch Flameaxe.
2) Flameaxe joins with me to lynch Beep.
3) Mizzy and Flameaxe join up to lynch either Holy or myself.

It seems like Flameaxe's input most pressing at the moment. Maybe we could get a prod?

Cam

[mathcam]

Don't really know what to say. Haven't seen any reason why I'm scum, only that if I am, I'm dangerous. Isn't really anything to say to that.

Well, there's who you're going to vote for, a decision that could possibly decide the entirety of this game. That seems like it might merit some discussion.

Cam

[mathcam]

No surprise on the night kill, I suppose. His lack of hammering at the end of yesterday was a pretty town tell. I'm a little surprised about Beep, but them's the breaks, I guess.

I'm not completely convinced one way or the other, but if I had to pick right now, I'd say that Holy is scum (which, if Holy still has her Mizzy suspicion, puts us in an interesting triangle). I need to re-read, but Holy's attempt yesterday attempt at convincing us that the cult (both the leader and the recruitees) was evil was just bizarrely implausible. To me, it is noteworthy that it behooves the SK to have another entity to take the blame for the nightkills.

I have to say that Mizzy's posts today seem slightly off, though. No remark on the unusual way in which yesterday ended, and no comment on the nightkill. Instead,

Oh, and I will NOT place a vote down first unless I really, really need to because I am town and that would cause a quicklynch if I am wrong in my voting. Also slightly suspect is that

sounds like a very forced attempt to seem pro-town. (This is not to say that I don't agree with the sentiment of no one voting yet). There's also the fact that she recently mentioned a semi-lurking status, and yet posted in this thread within a couple of hours of the start of the day, perhaps suggesting she'd had a night action.

All in all, these are pretty minor compared to the point on Holy I mentioned above, which seems somewhat inexplicable from a pro-town point of view.

Cam

[mathcam]

Fair enough. I too am caring for a newborn, so I know the feeling.

Cam

[mathcam]

Something potentially damning stuck out like a sore thumb on my reread:

Oh god, please don't head to night yet...I have so much more to read yet that I swear I'm never going to catch up.

If you didn't have a night-choice, wouldn't going to night help by giving you

more

time to catch up? On the other hand, an SK who needed to immediately make an intelligent night choice might see this as additional pressure.

Cam

[mathcam]

Well, I was in the middle of my big reread when I realized I had a pretty big stash of notes from my original read when I replaced in to the game. Interesting to see how my opinions have changed since then. This is a merge of the relevant stuff on Holy (Mizzy's next) from my original notes with stuff that has happened since then. (Posts are numbered as in the "view all posts by" numbering).

Holy

:
Post 1 - Holy votes for Has for what clearly looks like a posting restriction, and she even makes a comment as such. When someone the points out that Has likely has a posting restriction, she reluctantly unvotes. Definitely weird, possibly scummy. She does seem genuinely confused in posts 8 and 9, but also plays the "wait and see" game in post 8, which also looks a little scummy.

Post 10 - Holy votes for Monkey for an "overabundant" vote on GS, presumably in reference to putting him at L-2. Seems mildly contrived, but again, could be genuine.

Post 17 - Rather defensive against a pretty mild "attack" from MeMe.

Post 25 - Opposes tyhess recruiting anyone. Possibly a town tell, but I guess scum doesn't want a more powerful cult either.

Post 35 - Seems anxious about Pooky reveal. Worried she got caught?

Post 48 - Says that CKD's breadcrumb sucks. That's really weird, since it seemed quite compelling to me. Did Holy believe the breadcrumb and just want to get CKD lynched?

Post 53/54 - Got excited by a chance to join in an attack on me and then realized she didn't understand what the originator of the attack was saying. But later attacks Beep in post 57 for a distracting vote on me. Hm.

Posts 50-70ish - Waffles back and forth on Beep, but seems to be completely reversed from my stance. Thinks Beep is scum when I think she's town, and vice-versa. Weird. Attacks her scum scores, but then later says she thinks Beep is town because of all the work she did making them.

Posts 70-now - Occasionally anti-mathcam, but frequently anti-Mizzy:

Mizzy/Amelia/QB, I may contradict my logic about them because currently Mizzy is voting for Iammars, but I just found myself is distrustful against them when reading their posts, especially from QB's on day 1. Maybe just an over-suspicion for still not having a good read about them.

I'm still suspecting Mizzy more though :/

And... I feel Mizzy is SK, because I feel difficult reading her or her predecessors in this game although she's more active than me, my bad... =)

Not sure what to make of this.

Mizzy: Eh, maybe. But "I have so much more to read yet that I swear I'm never going to catch up." doesn't sound worried about having input on the day's lynch. Sounds more worried about not getting caught up

Cam

[mathcam]

EBWOP: Didn't finish that last sentence, apparently. Should've ended with "getting caught up in time to make a night choice." Since you've already claimed vanilla townie, this is a source of concern for me.

[mathcam]

I've said and done such things before as town; you're just reaching for some excuse to vote for me.

I made a 10-point post against Holy, for which she commended my effort. I made a 1-point post against you, and you interpret me as reaching for an excuse to vote you. This strikes me as a tad over-defensive. I wonder what you'll do when I post my full anti-Mizzy post.

In any case, I know some of my points are more or less stellar than others. I currently don't have a really good idea who's scum, and the way I deal with this is to list every point I can think of against each player, and seeing how they respond. Loosely speaking, whoever has the most incriminating evidence them at the end of the day will earn my vote, so you're right that in some sense I am search for reasons to vote you (but I'm doing the same for Holy).

Err.., wait... so you think CKD's breadcrumb was quite compelling, as far as I can remember, you were also insisting his lynch, explain how was that kind of thoughts aligned..!?

To clarify, I definitely thought he was scum, but I thought he did deliberately breadcrumb that he was a role-blocker as a safety net. Here's what I wrote at the time:

I have no doubt that his bread-crumb was deliberate, but I don't see that as particularly strong evidence in his favor. I think it's more likely that a pro-town ckd would have believed Pooky and revealed he was one of the two targeters, whereas a mafia would rather take his chances staying quiet and bread-crumbing in case it was necessary to come up with a cover story later.

Holy: Okay, while I process your defense some more, got any offense? Who do you think's the SK?

Cam

[mathcam]

SK is scum in my book. I don't think scum necessarily refers to mafia. Nor is the distinction really relevant to the content of Holy's point.

Plus, this has been asked and answered:

Holy: We're not looking for scum anymore, I think. We're looking for an SK or similar.

@Mizzy: Mafia, SK.. aren't they all Scum my dear... :p

Mizzy: I know you're busy, but do you have anything to contribute? You mentioned earlier that you thought I was most likely the SK. Do you still think that?

My gut still says Holy, but Mizzy's creeping up on the ol' scumdar rapidly. I can't help shake the feeling that she's just waiting for me to vote Holy so she can end the game.

Cam

[mathcam]

I've been promising a more substantive post for a while. I'll do it today.

Cam

[mathcam]

Quick post first:

Holy:

So what you are saying is that you don't think that scum (sk, whatever) would be taking notes in a game they are so very close to winning? If anything, I think the sk/scum would be more vigilant because one false move could lose them the whole game.

Doesn't one false move lose anyone the whole game? If anyone does anything particularly scummy today, they're likely to be lynched, and whoever gets lynched loses. Right?

Cam

[mathcam]

Interestingly enough, my anti-Mizzy post involves almost exclusively Mizzy herself -- I actually found Ameliaslay and Quickben (her two predecessors) pretty unreadable. Amelia mostly seemed to ask questions, and Quickben didn't last very long and mostly talked strategy about Jesters and cults. The only line that jumped out was

Nope. If we have a SK are you going to start giving *them* directions on how not to be found?

I understood the context of the quote, but the appearance of the SK really seemed random there. Maybe that role in particular was on his mind?

MIzzy herself has caught my eye several times, but most of these have been discussed in thread already. I'll just restate some of these.

Has, any reason why you don't want to tell us immediately?

This was in reference to his keeping his night information to his self. It still seems to me that Has had deliberately left off this information, so prompting him for more details feels like mild panic that she may have been caught. (Let's ignore that Has was actually scum, since we, or at least I, believed him to be pro-town at the time). But more suspicious was her reaction to this objection:

Wait, so trying to get more information is scummy? Asking why someone won't share information is a bad thing? Last I checked, sharing information is pro-town and hiding information is anti-town.

This sure looks like one of those "canned responses" that you later say you hate seeing. My objection was based on the specific situation at hand, and you respond with an extremely general meta. Finally, when I interpreted the above quoted questions as an accusation, you responded with "I simply asked a question in return." It seems a little disingenuous to me to imply that those questions didn't carry at least a hint of an attack (e.g., "You must be scum if you think the town getting information is bad.").

It's also worth pointing out that you seem to later agree with me that there are situations in which not revealing is the correct play:

The thing is that information sharing will always benefit both the town and the scum. That's just how things work. What you have to do is think about what information would help what side more.

That seems inconsistent with your previous claim that not wanting information shared is anti-town.

Next,

You guys are going to do what you want, when you want, and I feel like the only thing I can do is warn you and let you screw yourselves.

This stuck out, but I'm not sure what to make of it. This will probably be an important "gut read" quote if it comes down to that later for me.

And finally,

Oh, and I will NOT place a vote down first unless I really, really need to because I am town and that would cause a quicklynch if I am wrong in my voting.

This still seems a little over the top to me. It's true that this is a pro-town sentiment, but to paraphrase from DGB/Beep: It's pro-town if we notice it, it's scummy if you take the time to point it out to us.

Holy: Based on your note-taking theory, what do you think about Mizzy's post #13?

Cam

[mathcam]

That seems inconsistent with your previous claim that not wanting information shared is anti-town.

Sure, if you intentionally misrepresent or misinterpret my words.

How is this misinterpreting? You said almost exactly that in this post:

Last I checked, sharing information is pro-town and

hiding information is anti-town.

I assure you that if I am misinterpreting your words, it is completely unintentional.

To Holy: The scumminess alone thing was in reference to my choice between Beep and Flameaxe, since for some reason I had mostly ignored you and Mizzy up until that point. Scumminess-wise, I had Flame (and his predecessors) as pro-town most of the game, so Beep was the natural choice. It probably didn't help her cause that she kept insisting that I was scum.

Cam

[mathcam]

Whoops, forgot to respond to this:

I also failed sensing the strong evidence of her being scum with Flame's alivedness, actually.

Well, I think I explained it as well as I can back then, but I can give it another shot -- if anyone but Beep or Flameaxe were scum, then killing Flameaxe would have been a natural choice for at least two very powerful reasons: 1) Beep falls under heavy suspicion, and 2) There's no one with a double vote, which can be a game-turner in the end game. So obviously the evidence couldn't have been too strong, since it was wrong, given that I was wrong, but I still don't see why scum didn't get rid of Flame earlier -- the logic still seems pretty solid to me.

One more thought: Mizzy has made a deal of her not-voting-first stance being very pro-town, and at the start of the day I was putting a little credit into this philosophy, but the more I think about it, the less sure I am that this is true. Think about it -- scum's biggest hope in this situation is that one of the two non-scum votes for the other. On the other hand, putting out the first vote is a risky step for scum given that we're currently in a triangle of suspicion . Now, obviously,

none

of us have put out a first vote yet, so there's not

too

much to be read here, but then again, Mizzy's the only one implying that her not voting is pro-town.

Cam

[mathcam]

Another thought: If Mizzy were scum, the fact that she hasn't switched targets to Holy can perhaps be explained by her RL time restrictions. If Holy were scum, I don't have much of an explanation at all for why she wouldn't have switched targets to me. It sure would have been easier than trying to get me to swtich to Mizzy -- there's plenty of ammo out there against me, and I was attacking her at the start of the day. As a final meta, if Mizzy's not going to even consider changing her target, the only hope the town has of winning is that Mizzy's scum, since I can't get Holy lynched without her, and I know I'm town. All in all, that just doesn't leave me a lot of options -- Holy, you still aboard the Mizzywagon? I'd much rather decide this by lynch than by a deadline.

Cam

[mathcam]

Holy: I'm confused as to why you wouldn't have voted for Mizzy, then. Trying to leave options open?

Mizzy: Since I'm starting to think you're scum, maybe it's silly to continue to try to convince you, but note that if I were scum, I think it's clear how easy it would have been for me to have joined with Holy to get you lynched by now.

Cam

[mathcam]

The deadline is in three days, and since our posting is somewhat sporadic, it could take a day or so for the dust to settle. In any case, my intent was not to rush, but to probe.

Cam

[mathcam]

That's too late. Unless there's the immediate hammer, it'll take at least a day for the votee to plead their case for an unvote, and for people to process it. We're already short on time.

I'll make a decision tonight if you haven't done so by then.

Cam

[mathcam]

Time to come clean. I'm as confident as I think I'm going to get (say, 70/30) that Holy is the last scum. This suspicion was slightly present at the start of the day, but really developed after finishing both the "anti" posts earlier today -- I had plenty of things to bring up against Holy, but my points against Mizzy were mostly a stretch. The catch, of course, was that Mizzy seemed rather anti-mathcam at that point, so an aggressive attack on Holy would have likely ended the game quickly with a mathcam lynch. So I tried to make it look like my suspicions were balanced, and give Holy the sense that I might hammer Mizzy if Holy put the first vote on. In actuality, I was rather hoping Holy would vote Mizzy so that by not hammering Mizzy, I would prove myself pro-town to Mizzy, and we'd lynch Holy. The plan faltered when Holy deftly deferred placing a vote (you can see my disappointment in post 2154). The "taking a day for the dust to settle" I referenced before was this sequence of events. Now it would be too much of a risk to wait for Holy's vote sometime Sunday before attempting it, I've decided just to abandon it and go with my read.

Vote: Holy.

Mizzy: For what it's worth, I think it's highly likely that Holy would have come back with a vote on you, since a) her last several votes have all indicated you as her preference, and b) your last couple of
posts attacking her probably did not help your cause. So I think there's only a miniscule amount of WIFOM when I say that I almost certainly would not be making this post if I were scum -- I would just
make the vastly easier play of letting Holy place her vote on you, and then hammer. On the other hand, if you're scum, then, well, dammit.

Cam

[mathcam]

If Mizzy doesn't kill me overnight, the tension surely will.

Not the SK.

Cam

[mathcam]

I have no objections, but you should check with everyone else too.

Sorry, Mizzy! Your position sucked, but at least you know you couldn't have played it any better. Even no lynch wouldn't have helped.

How come Holy survived the nightkill?

Cam

[mathcam]

You also said that about RossWilliams, Farside, PetroleumJelly, thought that CKD was a Jester, that Holy was a mason, and that Pooky and has were town. Go figure.

Cam

[mathcam]

Oh, was PJ mith's mason?

Cam

[mathcam]

Thesp: Great game, and well-modded. Not that I had much doubt when I subbed it, but you're definitely on my list of mods I can trust.

The game: I'd never heard of sole masons before, so even though other people suggested that in thread, I dismissed that as the ravings of lunatics. As you'll see if the scum thread gets revealed, we were completely oblivious to the SK -- oblivious to the point that I was panicking about how we were going to explain Has not being nightkilled after being apparently the only remaining power role, only to find that he was killed overnight. That was a bit of a shock, but at least it told us that the extra kills were not coming from a vig but rather an SK. That was the only reason I was led to Holy in the first place, having otherwise completely ignored her for the entire game. I agree that the Has/CKD gambit was perhaps played prematurely, but they played their parts quite well, CKD even leaving me with extra ammunition against Beep when he died. Finally, I should point out that MeMe deserves a lot of credit for leaving so few scumtrails before she had to be replaced for work reasons.

PJ: While I found it genuinely frustrating at points, I was in awe of your mad meta skills. It was incredibly nerve-wracking attempting to make anything up while you were still alive, especially since I didn't have the real-life Thespival experience to supply ideas. I pushed to get you killed earlier than we did for exactly this reason. That said, this game definitely reminded he how much it sucked I couldn't make it.

Holy: Heh. Sorry that all my hard work in that last day to make sure

you

got lynched, and not Mizzy, was of no benefit to me, but yet deprived you of your win. Actually, I'm not that sorry. Again, though, well-played -- if I had been a townie, I quite possibly would have been convinced to go after Mizzy instead of you.

Cam

[mathcam]

If Holy wasn't lynched on the last day, would she have won since she was immune to mafia kills?

Both would have won, since both achieved their win conditions simultaneously. (Nothing could prevent the SK from being the only one alive at that point, and the mafia would be at 50% at that point.)

Wait, does that make sense? Nothing could

cause

Holy to be the only alive at that point (assuming we lynched Mizzy and not me), never mind

prevent

it.

Cam

[mathcam]

Wow. Talk about commanding some respect.

Cam

[mathcam]

Yup, the Werewolf should be the sole winner if that's the case, because nobody have any Silver Bullet in this town including the mafia, right? :p

But apparently this werewolf cares not only about being alive, but being the

only

one alive...and since I am such a potent godfather that my flesh is impenetrable even by werewolf teeth, you lose. Nanny nanny poo poo.

Oh, and thanks for the compliments, everyone, though I think that it might be excessive praise for an uninvestigatable unkillable mafia godfather with 4 teammates.

Cam

[mathcam]

Oh, and thanks for the compliments, everyone, though I think that it might be excessive praise for an uninvestigatable unkillable mafia godfather with 4 teammates.

Erm...you

weren't

NK immune or invetigative immune - the only "benefit" your role had was that if you died, Iammars died. (Hence Holy being able to win if Mizzy had been lynched.)

PJ, when did the mafia daytalk?

Oh. That's like the eighth time this game I got confused between the card text and the actual role text.

So what I meant to say when I said:

Oh, and thanks for the compliments, everyone, though I think that it might be excessive praise for an uninvestigatable unkillable mafia godfather with 4 teammates.

was:

Oh, and thanks for the compliments, everyone, though I think that it might be excessive praise for someone who basically had no idea what their role was.

Cam