Stars Aligned II - Game Over!

[Seacore]

I've been in other games and discussed "breaking" the game.

Often I'm for it. If there's a way to twist out an advantage for the town, then that's great.

In this case, however, it seemed to be substituting a mathematical formula in the place of scum hunting, from Day 1, to provide us with a good chance of winning.

Oh hey look, I've got some dice on my desk, if I get a 2 or higher, I win.. yay! I won!
That was fun

Now I'm ready to play mafia

[DrippingGoofball]

Ah well, sad to see Adel leave. He was town. So is SlySly. He drives me up the wall, in a delightful way, but his total disregard for how people can interpret him is unabashedly town.

[evilsnail]

If I'm reading it right, there's still something unexplained about the ani claim, right? We have no reason for why his Stalk didn't fail because of the Ward. I mean, I think the fact that his insanity has been confirmed means he's probably town, but it's still a little mystery.

Adel's claim that there are players from the last game on the cultist team was off. He said it with certainty, but then backed up with a largely probabilistic explanation.

Re breaking strategy: I'm all for it if it improves our chances. Adel replacing out seems a bit of an overreaction. If you're not willing to respect the mod's choices, you shouldn't play.

[Phate]

Something Nicodemus said early on rubbed me the wrong way, namely the way he fundamentally misunderstood the way ward worked. I realize that some people are less prone to carefully looking over the rules than others, but I know that I examined the Investigator actions very carefully and only skimmed the Cultist actions. Of the 'lurkers' (it's a bit early to call people lurkers, so I say it with scare-quotes, but he's not among the prolific posters so far and he hasn't contributed much yet), I'm most sure he is scum.

[evilsnail]

Yeah, I noticed that too. Good point.

Vote: Nicodemus

[iLord]

I'm currently taking it as evidence of pseudo-scumhunting, but I can fully compensate for my OMGUS reaction to what I consider overly wordy and poorly thought out posting that trys to implicate me as scummy.

I really don't think that it is sincere.

It does not appear that SlySly is good at scumhunting. I see no indication that it isn't sincere, however.

He has an insanity. I don't really see why scum would at this point.

Personal question, here. Would you consider Ani rational?

Have him test it on himself, on Sly sly gives him a different perspective. If he does it on himself, I believe it gives him a lot more pressure to tell the truth. If he's not lying, he's got nothing to worry about, but not on SlySly.

This is good.

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3. I want to play the game in the spirit that Percy had in mind when he created it. I seriously doubt that what is happening right now is not how he envisioned it.

I daresay that he would not necessarily oppose it in good faith. He stated in the signup thread that part of the point of the setup was that it offered multiple strategies for players to utilize. What Adel is attempting to do right now qualifies as such a strategy.

In designing such a complex setup, Percy, as the mod, is opening a challenge to the town to find the optimal use of night actions to win (And since it is very unlikely that players can find an absolute solution, scumhunting is typically used in conjunction with night actions). He obviously would not be satisfied with this result because it means in a sense that the players have proven that his setup is broken, but that is no more reason to not do it than it is to beat another runner in a race just because he'll be "disappointed" in the result.

On the plan itself, yeah, we're going to be sure that it actually works, but Adel's idea here seems like a good basis. It's ridiculous that a player would willingly handicap himself for the "spirit of the game." The spirit of this game here is to find the optimal use of night actions to facilitate scumhunting. Since the latter is inherently unreliable, it would logically entail that we should attempt to garner a large of an advantage as possible with the former, if possible.

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No! Adel, don't go!

I don't blame you on replacing out though. Some other players have been most uncooperative.

Yeah, I noticed that too.

Good point.

Vote: Nicodemus

Uh-huh.

[evilsnail]

Hmm?

[elvis_knits]

Why is this thread 17 pages long now?

[Phate]

Bleh.

Mod: replace me please.

I've been trying for the last few hours to decide whether I want to play in this game. I started questioning when the mod answered my 'do you have a problem with us breaking your game' post.

I really like this game. I love the flavor and the theme, and the way everything in the rules is explicit, cross-referenced, and color-coded. I like the idea of paranoid investigators going rogue and becoming murderers while the cult stays cohesive and gradually kills off the investigators. Hell, I even like some of the players in the game. I am disappointed to leave this game.

At the same time, I feel a bit betrayed as a player. I don't like that Percy essentially told me "You can try any tactic you want, but if it works I'll make it fail to work". I hate the idea of the rules being changed mid-game, especially in a game which doesn't have a 'I reserve the right to change the rules' rule (unless you count "The mod's decisions are final", and I don't). What really gets me is that this seems to be actively barring players from attempting to work together and coordinate night actions, or to make it less efficient (I'm not sure where the threshold is), and town cooperation and coordination is one of the most fun parts of the game for me.

Gah. I'm starting to rant a bit, which was not my intention. Anyway: with no irony at all, congratulations for a very well-designed game, Percy, but I don't think it's for me. If you don't have a replacement lined up, PM me and I'll find one.

[Percy]

Let me make something abundantly clear.

I do not believe a breaking strategy exists. I have worked very, very hard to make sure there is no such thing in this game.

A "breaking strategy" is something that

breaks the game

. If there is some sequence of Night Actions that one faction can take to

ensure

their victory, then I believe this will make the game very unsatisfying for all involved. If it becomes broken, then I have two choices - either let it play out, or fix it and let play continue. If the fix were to change anything fundamental about the game, then the game would be abandoned.

I'm not going to change the rules if some element of the game can be exploited to give one side an

advantage

. In fact, I've built many such things into this game deliberately, so that careful and observant players can help their side (or themselves, as the case may be...)

I hope this makes my position crystal clear. I have no desire to spoil your fun, and I am an avidly strategic player myself. I also can assure you, with 99.99% confidence, that the rules will be unaltered throughout the course of the game.

[VP Baltar]

ITT, people pout and should just be playing the game.


I'm not caught up at all (only skimmed) because you guys are posting ridiculous amounts about really trivial things. Has anyone claimed to have warded me yet?

[Phate]

Alright, consider post 408 to have not existed. Percy's post 409 definitely set my mind at ease.

[elvis_knits]

I'm up to page 9... I did not ward VP Baltar.

[Drench]

Yeah, I noticed that too.

Good point.

Vote: Nicodemus

Uh-huh.

yeah i noticed that too

Evil, if you had noticed that, why didn't you mention it? Why did you withhold that you had noticed this until someone else mentioned it? And then, when someone did mention it, why didn't you elaborate on what you thought was scummy about it, rather than just using someone else's case?

did we notice that too

[elvis_knits]

I'm up to page 9... I did not ward VP Baltar.

I also didn't ward Adel.

[evilsnail]

I'd noticed it on my read through and thought it was a bit off, but I didn't think too much about it and kinda forgot about it when reading all the stuff about ani. When Phate brought it up, I realised why it had seemed off to me in the first place. I've caught scum before on the basis of a preoccupation with only certain aspects of the rules.

[Amished]

You guys are all nuts.

Also, thank god for Adel leaving as that'll cut down on null-tell-orific talk about the setup. As a side note, I would have been opposed to the strategy since I'm about playing the game, and not padding the stats. I don't get better at scumhunting if I'm just following a formula that would just be an "auto-win" button.

Evil: Why didn't you bring it up when you "saw" it though? Now that somebody else brought it up you can attack him over it? I think you didn't want to expose yourself by attacking somebody over something small as scum.

Vote: evilsnail

[dramonic]

I still maintain that the success of said "setup-break" is doubtful at best, especially considering it's supposed to keep Ani alive when he has basically pretty high odds of being MURDERER.

Who vigs night 0, seriously?

Better yet, why is he being unvoted?

[evilsnail]

I only saw it like a couple of hours ago, on my first read through all of the thread, and, as I said, I forgot about it.

[SlySly]

Personal question, here. Would you consider Ani rational?

Yes. He tried something but it failed miserably. That doesn't make him irrational.

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

Who vigs night 0, seriously?

Better yet, why is he being unvoted?

No one vig'd N0. Ani stalked, big difference. Ani is town.

[dramonic]

Correct me if I'm wrong, everyone who stalked in the first game n0 flipped murderer.

[SlySly]

Correct me if I'm wrong, everyone who stalked in the first game n0 flipped murderer.

You are wrong. My predecessor stalked and I never murderered or became a murderer. I was town the entire time.

[dramonic]

n0?

[SlySly]

n0?

I think so, but I could be wrong. My predecessor had chosen Psychopathy, which no one in this game has yet, but Percy allowed me to change that choice when I replaced in. I don't remember though exactly where the game was when I came in.

[dramonic]

well if he picked psychopathy he WANTED to be a murderer, so my point stands