Mini #582: Meta Mafia Mini! GAME OVER!

[EmpTyger]

mathcam/Johoohno:
Deja vu, but if mneme is mafia, who do you think is mafia with him?

[The Fonz]

For example: Let's say that Primate is telling the truth and he is pro-town. He has the ability to "protect" a player by putting another player in harms way. If Primate chooses some random player Night 1, who happens to be an investigator ect., and redirects a target from scum to this investigator role, he has directly cost the town a power role and his actions should be viewed as scummy.

This is supremely bad logic. Powers such as Primate's should always be used randomly on Night 0. Given that he himself is a power role, the chances of the person he's redirecting to being a power role is lessened, and the chance of that person being scum are better-than-random. Also, if the person being redirected from is scum, there's no possibility of scum targetting that player (a potential SK might, but i'm not into SK speculation before there's been a multikill night). With this in mind, this possibility of redirecting a kill from a scum to a power role is nonexistant. If I were primate, I absolutely would have used my power N0.

Also, it can confirm you later. Same reason why roleblockers should always act night one.

It seems too many players would rather try to outguess the mod and rely blindly on metas than actually *think* about what information we actually have. And I’m worried that too many players will follow nebulous nightactions over actual, in-thread, suspicious behavior.

I find this comment to be crap. What information do we actually know? Why not use a combination of night actions and their in game suspicious behavior to actually formulate an attack. Who here are you accusing of trying to out guess the mod? The one who wants a mass claim, so that scum can formulate a more perfect attack on our power roles?

I actually agree with this. But then, I HATE massclaims in almost all situations. I believe them to be generally detrimental wherever a mod is remotely competent, and I don't believe the circumstances of this game make it any better as an idea.

I have information which might negate TSN’s information regarding Primate.

This is why it is pointless trying to factor Primate's role claim into a decision whether to vote/lynch him.

Well, not really. Primate's role is useful. If we ever have an information role claim, Primate could keep that role alive.

I may be twisting how I'm seeing things due to my perceived scumminess in TSN, but it still doesn't change the fact that I think he's scum.

unvote, vote TSN

But if his actions require twisting to make them look scummy, then they're not scummy inherently. So you have no reason to suspect him in the first place, right?

I actually think massclaiming, especially in THIS game, makes it harder for Mafia to make stuff up. There's too much misdirection (and evidently blocking) for them to be able to fakeclaim with any certainty. If things don't add up, we have a better opportunity to start narrowing down who lied.

Disagree. Let's look at the two possible scenarios here.

1. The town is composed primarily of roles with actions. In this case, scum are likely to have been given powers as well, so the benefits of massclaim are minimal. OTOH, showing who has which role helps them bigtime with their NKs.

2. The town has plenty of vanilla townies. We out all the roles, without necessarily nailing any scum.

Neither of these are good.

*Massive and Stoofer. Massive was asking questions and Stoofer was ignoring those questions. The questions, IMO, were designed to alleviate suspicious actions from Stoofer. However, Stoofer ignored these questions and instead acted more suspicious.

I don't get what you're saying here. Are you saying the questions massive put to stoof seemed designed to ascertain information about his alignment, or to give Stoof the opportunity to give pro-town sounding answers? Because if Stoofer is scum (as I currently believe) then that should not be seen as protown.

Your point here is misleading to the town, and scummy in my opinion. I did not vote, at all, until I placed my vote on the player I thought was most suspicious, Primate. I have put my suspicions regarding both Primate and Stoofer in writing for everyone to see. Just because I am not voting for the player you find most suspicious does not mean that I do not find him scummy.

This is what mafia players DO (or pretend to do, if scum). When someone has two suspects, but acts in such a way to bring about the lynch of one, and criticises the other without actually making their lynch more likely, then that is useful information should one, other, or both come up scum later.

.


1. No, trying to determine if a player is innocent, by the questions that they ask, has a townish feel. Did you read the types of information that Massive was asking? Did you think massive was scum because of this? Do you now think massive is scum because of this?

See my point above. Trying to find out someone's alignment through pressing them, and 'trying to give them a townish feel' are completely different things.

I do not think that Massive is scum because he was trying to question Stoofer about points that would make him seem more town, instead I see massive as being town because he was acting like a townsperson by asking relevant information regarding Stoofer's play. I interperted his questions as developed to elicit information that would show Stoofer as just being careless and less anti-town.

OK, I kind of get what you're saying, but you still make it sound like massive was feeding Stoof the kind of questions that he could easily answer in such a way as to make Stoof look town.

3. "Attacking a suspicious player is a sign of guilt." It is a gambit. Of course if you know who is scum, it would make it easier for you to attack a guilty player and score HUGE town points if you get him lynched. I have seen this happen in other games, where one player makes a mistake and his scum buddy uses that to score big town points in his favor by lynching him. This is entirely plausible.

Attacking people who are actually scummy is still, on balance, a pro-town indicator.

If Primate is innocent, I do strongly agree with you. But if he’s guilty- which you thought at the time, think now, and have thought all day- then it’s a point *against* Fonz.

Hang on. Are you saying whether or not avoiding the quicklynch is only protown if the victim is town, Emp? Because as far as i can see, townies don't know the alignment of anyone else, so therefore the instinct to not quicklynch is universal.

________________________

At this stage, I'd like to think we're heading toward a link. Even more so, I'd like it to be Stoofer's.

I will not support a Primate wagon.

I prefer a Stoofer wagon strongly. There are a couple of others I'd be willing to lynch if a stoofwagon becomes unviable (mostly people i think are scum) but I'd much rather we got rid of the lawyer, and soon.

[mneme]

I'll concede that you might have meant something different than what I thought you meant if you'll concede that I wasn't somehow intentionally trying to twist your words.

I'll conceed its possible that you misenterpeted me (and quoted the points that you'd misenterpreted rather than the adjacent ones that seemed to express the opposite sentiment because those were the ones you'd focused on).

Emptyger's claim made sense when I first read it, but I'm sort of souring on it. Or, at least, I'm souring on it making you scummy. You're still wrong about it me being scum, and you aren't going to convince me that any additional claim would be at all beneficial, except, of course, in the context of a massclaim, which would be a good idea.

I don't, at the moment, any way, think your scumminess (or not) is tied to emptiger's scuminess (or not).

Re claims: Er, what? Isn't this how we play mafia? We BW someone, when we have critical mass, we get a claim from them (if it's helpful; in some games, claims are worse than useless, as living claimed people are too much of a hindrance, but that's a rare exception); we evaluate the claim, possibly getting coroberating/conflicting claims from other people, then we either lynch or not; then repeat. The result is sometimes very like a massclaim, but the process isn't, as we're getting claims in a combination of proceedural and suspicion order. So saying "I'm not interested in getting or giving claims unless we have a massclaim" seems beyond the point; by and large, we don't get to a massclaim with a majority vote; we get there by getting enough claims that we figure it's worth beating the rest out of people and then doing so. If we have enough info to want to lynch before we're fully claimed today, what's the harm in it (or even better, from my POV, as the scum have a worse idea of who to try to kill).

[quote="TheSweatpantsNinja"

A well designed game doesn't favor town in a too-early massclaim, because the scum, with extra info, can pick out info they find useful and ignore the rest, whereas the town cannot pick out mafia claims from town claims.

I don't think its going to break the game, and I don't think (although I'd be pleasantly surprised) if it reveals scum. The problem is, judging by the set-up, its going to be impossible to determine whether claims are true or not, because clearly just about anything is going to be feasible. Having all the role information out in the open, with a lot of roles that are likely to be confirmable, while it might benefit scum in deciding who to kill, is likely to benefit us in being able to confirm night activities. (do you really think it likely that we have more valuable town roles like a cop?) Let mafia decide between killing a role switcher or a, um, whatever primate is (a reverse bus driver?).[/quote]

I do think it's likely that we have at least some cop-like roles, yes. And if Primate is telling the truth, we have at least one doc-like role (yes, his role is doc-like -- assuming he's town, while he can mess up investigations (like a roleblocker, which is also doclike), or pointlessly retarget kills, he can also retarget kills to scum, acting as doc+vig, given the right choices. And if we had a kill-immune protown player, he could retarget likely kills there, both proving the immunity and saving the target. I don't think we do, though.). -- keeping in mind that doc-type roles are -higher- priorities for scumkills than cop-like roles are, assuming both are out.

Moreover, I simply fail to see how deciphering claims is harder in an "honor system" where people do partial claims to verify/deny roles (ie, like a normal game) than it is with a fully claimed game. Yes, sure, the mafia, if they're involved in an interaction, may lie and get someone killed, but that can be found out eventualy, and is true in either case. But if all the conflicts are pro-town, we can unweave them without having to get full claims from everyone involved, and I think this favors the town more and the mafia less.

Re the Primate case, the possiblitieis I see are: 1. Primate is lying (possible. very wifom). 2. Emptyger gave away his own vote and is withholding useful info (I'm actually beginning to look this way, given Emptyger's other behavior. If Stoof isn't scum, Emptyger probably is). 3. You interfered with Primate's choice/action in some otherwise unexplained way (and some third party did the vote manipulation) and are revealing partial info. 4. Underpants. I mean, Other; someone else (probably scum, or over-cagy town) interfered with one of the participants. I do see how expanding our info base until we have at least one picture of what happened helps the town here.

mneme:
...Do you have any interest in clearing this up? Or, now that your attack on TSN has failed, are you trying to salvage something of it with an attack on me? I’d rather not put words in your mouth, but you’re not leaving me with much choice.

Really? Because it seems like the entire argument (mneme/EmpTyger, anyway) is all about your putting words in my mouth. (as opposed to mneme/TSN, which is all about TSN only quoting the words that supported his argument). Both of my cases against either of you are based on process -- not connection -- but errors of process, in this game, are scumtells of a high order.

<snip>
Claiming "mneme did X for Y reasons" when all the text of the thread indicates that mneme did X for Z reasons is either a claim of mind-reading or a flat-out lie. Which is it?
<snip>

You keep restating my "X for Y" parts, which I perfectly understand, and ignoring what I'm actually asking you about, "Z".
We agree that:
X = you attacked TSN
Y = TSN defending Primate

[/quote]

Actually, we don't. TSN didn't defend Primate. Aside from my not remembering to count, this was the mistake with my Primate vote -- because pushing Primate up toward lynch wasn't useful pressure against TSN, who acted as he should in that case, as if, aside from wanting to reveal that he might have semi-useful info, he didn't care that much whether Primate was lynched.

But you seem to want to claim that I attacked him because he was defending Primate? Whereas my claim -- that I attacked him because his argumentitive errors were scummy, out of frustration and because, in fact, such errors -are- scummy, is oddly consistent with my attacking Stoofer because his sloppiness was scummy, and...oddly enough, with my attacking you because -your- errors are scummy. Which reminds me:

unvote
IGMEOY: TSN

You won’t clarify what Z equals.

Er, what? Z was so obvious, even a deaf bat could get it. I attacked TSN because he, multiple times, selectively quoted me in a way that distorted my actual statements. That's why I said I was voting him, and oddly enough, it's true.

Z better not be (3). TSN had a reason for his leading question, and if you were telling the truth in [318] you should have realized it immediately. (And for the record, if there is a massclaim, this is a strong reason why you should go towards the beginning.)

Not really, he didn't. 3 was out-and-out fishing. Hypocritical, at that, since TSN's approach has been "I'm not going to do an informative claim unless everyone else does it", and yet here he was, fishing for role claims.

Z can’t be (2), because in [308] you said that TSN had committed OMGUS. Which means that, according to you, TSN’s attack on you came after you attacked him.

Er, what?

In 305, TSN fished and quot/distorted me.

In 306, I voted him, and ate the fish, along with the hook.

In 307, he voted me.

In 308, I called that an OMGUS.

So, yes, I attacked and voted him before he voted or attacked me.

And your defense has been to ignore it or to grandstand with unsupported denunciations and double-dog dares or to call me and anyone who disagrees with you “lying scum”. TSN, me, mathcam, Johoohno (presumably, by his vote), and Stoofer all have disagreed with you, and you can’t dismiss all of us by calling us “lying scum”.

Are you even reading this crap? You just contradicted yourself in the same paragraph.

Hell, you also lied; I've not called anyone lying scum (you do know the quotes mean that it's what I actually said, right?) nor have I claimed anyone lied...except Stoof (about his own thought processes, after he admited to same) and oh, right, you. So "anyone who disagrees with me" is either Stoof and you, or it's TSN, you, cam, jono, and Stoof. It can't be both, you know.

…But, here’s the silly thing. I actually am less suspicious of you than others on my list, despite this. Rather, I think that you are stubbornly incapable of admitting you could be wrong,

Oh, look, another lie. Didn't I do this last post? Pointing out that I'd -also- (if weakly, calling my vote on Primate sloppy) done so earlier?

Sorry, Emptyger, if you can't keep to the facts in the thread, I can't see why you would do so with other things, like, say, your night action.

vote: Emptyger

[massive]

I may be twisting how I'm seeing things due to my perceived scumminess in TSN, but it still doesn't change the fact that I think he's scum.

But if his actions require twisting to make them look scummy, then they're not scummy inherently. So you have no reason to suspect him in the first place, right?

While I appreciate you only quoting a part of my posts, out of context even (the sentence and the "twisting" refers to my suspicion of what TSN's "plan" could be, not to his scumminess), I'll take this opportunity to say, YET AGAIN, that I find his willingness to "clear" Primate with half-information very suspicious. I've put out WHY I think TSN is suspicious in a post that spoke to that SPECIFIC question. You may refer to [336] for future half-quoting and context-maiming.

I actually think massclaiming, especially in THIS game, makes it harder for Mafia to make stuff up. There's too much misdirection (and evidently blocking) for them to be able to fakeclaim with any certainty. If things don't add up, we have a better opportunity to start narrowing down who lied.

Disagree. Let's look at the two possible scenarios here.

1. The town is composed primarily of roles with actions. In this case, scum are likely to have been given powers as well, so the benefits of massclaim are minimal. OTOH, showing who has which role helps them bigtime with their NKs.

2. The town has plenty of vanilla townies. We out all the roles, without necessarily nailing any scum.

Neither of these are good.

In situation (1), in my opinion, it forces the Mafia to either (a) tell the truth about their roles, and thus make night choices for their roles that at least APPEAR townish, which would benefit the town, or (b) lie about either their roles or their night choices, which a massclaim would help in tracking down. Sure, I understand that it helps them pick their nightkills, but it also undercuts a lot of the misdirection that they can spread in the daytime.

And while I appreciate that (2) may exist, I don't think you OR I believe that it really does.

[The Fonz]

Ah yes, your response there reminds me of how horrible and illogical your case on TSN really is.

Also, here is the full post:

Sorry, I don’t buy it. You’re not analyzing what you’re reading and making a conclusion about TSN. He’s guilty, no matter what, according to your logic. (Well, unless he fullclaims. But in the case of everyone else, you’re against hearing claims.)

I don't see anywhere in the game where I've said one way or the other if I'm in favor of the massclaim (which appears to be what you are referring to in that last sentence). Can you please explain what I've said that makes you feel I am against hearing claims?

I may be twisting how I'm seeing things due to my perceived scumminess in TSN, but it still doesn't change the fact that I think he's scum.

unvote, vote TSN

The 'context' you speak of makes not a damn bit of difference to the meaning of the statement.

[EmpTyger]

I’m not going to argue with mneme, because he is clearly not interested in having a honest discussion. If anyone else wants I fuller rebuttal for any point he has argued about me, him, TSN, or massclaims, ask and I’ll provide one. I will point out the most glaring contradictions, so that hopefully no one takes any of his rantings seriously.

<snip>
Actually, we don't.

TSN didn't defend Primate.

Aside from my not remembering to count, this was the mistake with my Primate vote -- because pushing Primate up toward lynch wasn't useful pressure against TSN, who acted as he should in that case, as if, aside from wanting to reveal that he might have semi-useful info, he didn't care that much whether Primate was lynched.
<snip>

And an OMGUS, too.

TSN, your defense of Primate was protown,

but that only goes so far.

Anyway, see you Monday. Same bat time, same bat channel.

<snip>
Hell, you also lied;

I've not called anyone lying scum (you do know the quotes mean that it's what I actually said, right?)

nor have I claimed anyone lied...except Stoof (about his own thought processes, after he admited to same) and oh, right, you. So "anyone who disagrees with me" is either Stoof and you, or it's TSN, you, cam, jono, and Stoof. It can't be both, you know.
<snip>

<snip>
Stoofer: Re primate, nothing's changed. But then, my only reason to consider him scummy was his claim, and while TSN's non-defense isn't actually useful for validating the claim, it does tie (vaguely) indicate that -if- TSN is not scum, Primate might not be

lying scum

.
<snip>

(it’s phrased circuitously, but it comes out to mneme is saying that Primate is lying scum, since he’s been arguing that TSN is scum.)

<snip>
So overall, I'd characterize him as "

lying scum

, trying to buddy up to a townie" making TSN as scum, and Primate as townie. Or he could be lying scum trying to save a buddy without tying their alignments together and trying to avoid hinting at a role he can't prove. Either way, we should lynch TSN.
<snip>

If I had any hope that Primate would respond, I would ask him for an unvote, because I guess I do need to prioritize pairings involving mneme, and that will require going back to square 1.

---

Fonz:

<snip>
Hang on. Are you saying whether or not avoiding the quicklynch is only protown if the victim is town, Emp? Because as far as i can see, townies don't know the alignment of anyone else, so therefore the instinct to not quicklynch is universal.
<snip>

If the victim is mafia, then you are correct that a townsperson has reasons to avoid a quicklynch. But a mafia also then has reasons to avoid the quicklynch- namely, they don’t want their comafia to die! So, if the victim is not town, then it cannot be concluded that the quicklynch-avoided is protown.

In this case, KingPin thought the victim (Primate) was mafia, and so should have had no basis to conclude that the quicklynch-avoider (Fonz) was protown. But KingPin’s logic makes sense if he was lying about his assessments- which is consistent with the other problems I found.

[EmpTyger]

EBWODP:
Sorry, that last line should read quicklynch-avoide*r*. Fixed below:

---

If the victim is mafia, then you are correct that a townsperson has reasons to avoid a quicklynch. But a mafia also then has reasons to avoid the quicklynch- namely, they don’t want their comafia to die! So, if the victim is not town, then it cannot be concluded that the quicklynch-avoider

quicklynch-avoided

is protown.

In this case, KingPin thought the victim (Primate) was mafia, and so should have had no basis to conclude that the quicklynch-avoider (Fonz) was protown. But KingPin’s logic makes sense if he was lying about his assessments- which is consistent with the other problems I found.

[Johoohno]

mathcam/Johoohno:
Deja vu, but if mneme is mafia, who do you think is mafia with him?

Is it really wise to speculate on pairings day 1?

[The Fonz]

Emp- my problem is that you said this:

But if he’s guilty- which you thought at the time, think now, and have thought all day- then it’s a point *against* Fonz.

Which implies that not quicklynching a scum would be an indication of scumminess, when the natural town reaction is not to quicklynch, precisely because you don't know the alignment of that player. I'd agree that not quicklynching does not score on the town side of the ledger if the player in danger is scum, but I have a *very* hard time to see how doing so could ever count *against* a player.

[mneme]

Emptyger: if you can't play the game with even a pretense of honesty, no, I can't be "reasonable". But I can vote you, and am. And no, saying "if so and so is lying scum, ..." is not saying they're lying; -you- are liar, wheras Primate is only a liar if he's lied about his role (which is kinda, you know, obvious). I don't believe you are as stupid as you appear -- therefore, I do believe you are scum.

Fonz: There are some rare moments when anti-quicklynching can count against a player. In particular, if a player is -1 shy, particularly when the -1 was announced and there's no new evidence, this begs the question of whether the player is scum trying to avoid being on a townie lynch or trying to save a buddy that they were previously bussing. Of course, this isn't true in your case.

[massive]

TheFonz

: So you believe that TSN's actions are the actions of a townie? If you had had information that you felt could clear Primate (or heck, Stoofer, since those were the two big bandwagons), would you have come forward? Would you have done so if you were unsure of your information and felt that it would make no difference?

[mathcam]

mathcam/Johoohno:
Deja vu, but if mneme is mafia, who do you think is mafia with him?

While I don't think it's necessarily "unwise" to speculate on pairings, it's also not the case that I feel the need to peg down the full mafia set before going after a suspect. If we lynch Mneme and he turns out to be scum, there will be ample opportunity to figure out who his partners are, if any. If I had to make a call now, I'd say that Emp and TSN are not scumbuddies with Mneme, and that massive would be my top choice, but I don't have a lot of good reasons for either.

Apologies for not posting much. The last couple of pages have been pretty bickery and my eyes have been glazing over a little. I'd really like to see a lynch and some nightkills, and start fresh with some new information. (And to think someone worried that Emp might need extra motivation to post given his missing vote... )

Cam

[TheSweatpantsNinja]

If you had had information that you felt could clear Primate (or heck, Stoofer, since those were the two big bandwagons), would you have come forward? Would you have done so if you were unsure of your information and felt that it would make no difference?

So, just because I couldn't be sure my role prevented primate's ability from working, means I should have stayed silent? Is that what

you're

saying? If so, why?

[EmpTyger]

Johoohno:

mathcam/Johoohno:
Deja vu, but if mneme is mafia, who do you think is mafia with him?

Is it really wise to speculate on pairings day 1?

Fair enough, and maybe that’s the answer. It’s just a little hard for me to get my heart behind mneme, when it flies against every observation I made before.

(Though in general, absolutely I’ll speculate on pairings on Day N if I have reason to, since there’s no guarantee I’ll be alive and able to on Day N+1. But that’s not to set up dominos- there should be full reevaluation on Day N+1.)

---

Fonz:

Emp- my problem is that you said this:

But if he’s guilty- which you thought at the time, think now, and have thought all day- then it’s a point *against* Fonz.

Which implies that not quicklynching a scum would be an indication of scumminess, when the natural town reaction is not to quicklynch, precisely because you don't know the alignment of that player. I'd agree that not quicklynching does not score on the town side of the ledger if the player in danger is scum, but I have a *very* hard time to see how doing so could ever count *against* a player.

That could have been more completely accurate, I suppose. I was focusing only on the anti-case at that point because the pro-case wasn’t in doubt, and I had already tried 3 times and gotten stonewalled.

<snip>
But then, I HATE massclaims in almost all situations. I believe them to be generally detrimental wherever a mod is remotely competent, and I don't believe the circumstances of this game make it any better as an idea.
<snip>

I think this is the crux of the massclaiming dispute. I do believe the circumstances of this game make it better as an idea. Although I’m not sure what to say or try that I haven’t already.

---

mneme:
<deliberately ignoring>

[massive]

So, just because I couldn't be sure my role prevented primate's ability from working, means I should have stayed silent? Is that what

you're

saying? If so, why?

I'm saying that it doesn't make sense, to me, to come out with that information. It doesn't help save Primate. It doesn't even convince YOU that Primate is innocent. So why bring it up? All it does is confuse and distract the town. There's no other purpose to it.

[mneme]

Bah.

Emptyger's been annoying the hell out of me, but at the moment, I don't think he's actually scum; he's trying too hard to find mafia.

Which, I suppose, is something like how he feels about me at the moment, given his last post.

unvote

[TheSweatpantsNinja]

Which is more or less how I feel about you at this point.

Anyway, massive: I had relevant, if inconclusive, information. I suppose I did distract the town from lynching primate. Do you think that was a mistake?

[TheSweatpantsNinja]

Oh, and

Unvote.

Oops.

[massive]

TSN

: That's an impossible question to answer. You didn't reveal any information. You didn't, necessarily, contribute to the town NOT lynching Primate. It's hard to imagine what your goal was, so it's impossible to judge if you failed in that regard.

[Johoohno]

Mod:

Could we get a vote count please.

[Johoohno]

EBWOP: and what about prods (and potential replacements): any news?

[mneme]

How many inactive players do we have?

[KingPin]

Last post:

DoTS - May 20
Emp - May 29
Johoohno - May 30
KingPin - May 30
massive - May 30
mathcam - May 28
mneme - May 30
Mr Stoofer - May 22 (noted he would not be back until Monday June 2)
Primate - May 9
The Fonz - May 28
thesweatpantsninja - May 29

[the silent speaker]

Primate has already been prodded and I have begun looking for replacements. Votecount and deadline will be posted at the top of the coming page.

[the silent speaker]

This post exists to push to a new page.