Open 233: Ninja Mafia Boogaloo - Over!

[Zorblag]

Good day everyone. I'll be replacing SensFan. It looks like I know a few of the people in the thread and I look forward to getting to know the rest of you. You're welcome to call me Zorblag, Zorb, Zor, Z or Troll. If you're interested in how I play, my previous games are all listed on my Wiki Page. Some of the links for the older games are broken as of the move to the new boards but the recent game links are working fine (the rest should be in the archives somewhere but I haven't bothered tracking everything down as I think the links are supposed to get a universal fix eventually.) If you'd like to know more about me outside the games you can check out my GTKAS Thread. If you've got any questions that the two of those don't answer feel free to ask. I'm not technically an IC this game as there aren't any but you're welcome to treat me as a resource for how things go on Mafia Scum if you're new to the site. Happily there are others here who will be fine resources as well.

So I'd like to start with some rules of thumb that I use for the F11 setup but which should still be mostly applicable here (as in some ways we're dealing with a double newbie game.) Most of you are aware of these but for those that are relatively new and might not be I think they're helpful. There's a Mafia Discussion thread about them here if you'd like to see what other experienced players had to say about them (as well as a couple other things that might be worth looking at.)

Here are some rules of thumb that I like a lot for the current newbie setup. There are no absolute rules in mafia and others might disagree about some of them (and I'm happy to discuss them so long as we don't detract from the game itself by doing it) but I'm a fairly traditional/conservative player and find these to be useful.

1. Townies without power roles should not lie about their role except in very specific situations (which are unlikely to come up in newbie games.) Lying to save yourself from a lynch as a vanilla townie is much more likely to hurt the town than to help in the long run.

2. Townies without power roles should generally not claim to be vanilla townies. This makes it easier for the scum to figure out who the power roles are if there are any. Assuming that townies are following rule 1 they should avoid making claims other than simply being a pro-town role unless there is some strategy that the Town is using (e.g. massclaim at LyLo) or they are about to be lynched anyhow and keeping their non-power role status no longer makes it easier for the scum to find power roles.

3. If you suspect someone else of having a power role you shouldn't out them. Support them if you see a way to do it that doesn't out them and watch carefully to see if there are reasons to reassess your belief. Leave the claim of the power role to them unless you think that they will be lynched while they are away and wouldn't be able to make the claim them self.

4. If you do have a power role you should keep it hidden for now. Do not let yourself get lynched without revealing it but there is no reason to advertise it at the start in the setups that we could be in. If the scum know who have the power roles now they have the power to lynch or role block powers during the night and negate their usefulness.

5. If you're town, don't self hammer. This kills a pro town role and hurts the town's chances in the long run. It's much better to try to defend yourself or at the very least force the other players to place the last vote. There are exceptions when a deadline is involved but in general don't think that you're doing the town any favors by self hammering.

If any of those are unclear please do ask about them.

Beyond that,
VOTE: AGar for being the first person alphabetically by user name not to have posted since the game started. For anyone who cares, that's L-7 I believe.

Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

I'll start with the important bit. L-2 does not mean it's time to claim. It's time to claim when we've got someone in the thread who's ready to hammer. Until then it's time for the person being wagoned to defend them self. When someone claims we should be having them claim because we're ready to lynch them and I doubt we're at that point for Shattered Viewpoint just now.

@Sotty7, if you don't think I'm paying attention to the type of game this is do you disagree with any of my rules of thumb for what we want to do here? I claim that I'm pretty sure I know both the setup and the player mix we're dealing with and I made that post because I thought it was important to get that stuff out there.

@Beefster, I don't have a cola preference or a favorite setup (though simple is usually easier for me to deal with). Other than being a fairly conservative, deliberate player much of the time I don't think that I can give a quick summary of my meta that would be that helpful though I'm not at all hesitant to talk about it situationally as it comes up. I think that my win loss record right now is 22-9 but mafia is a team game so I'm not that responsible for most of the wins (or some of the losses.) Four games at a time would be my absolute limit and I'd prefer not to go to that many.

Do you really not see why people found Shattered Viewpoint suspicious. You might not agree that what he's done is scummy (personally, I think this is just how he plays his games) but I think that it's pretty clearly not just for laughs that people are casting their votes.

@Zajnet, it's interesting that you'd notice Paltry Excuse had posted but (apparently, given your first post) not AGar.

@AGar, I was otherwise occupied but it's nice to know you care I guess? Did you know that StrangerCoug suggested the setup when you asked his feeling about balance? I sort of think that if you did you'd know the answer to that question based on what he said in the Open Game suggestion thread.

@PaltryExcuse, I do think that at least some of Beefster's questions were worth knowing the answer to as they should help with expectations of play. Having said that, commenting on other things is also a good idea as one answers questions of the sort.

@Shattered Viewpoint, how big a tell do you think paying attention is? Or do you think it's a tell at all?

@Col.Cathart, when I think the answers to questions are obvious I'll answer for others when I'm town with no hesitation. I do have people complain about it from time to time but it saves time when I think it's clear something's not going anywhere useful. That doesn't apply here but in this case there were only really two answers to the question being asked (both opinions) and Beefster gave his opinion one way. It didn't give StrangerCoug any particular leg up with an answer he might give.

Also, you're on an L-2 wagon and don't seem to have given any reasons for that vote (or in fact mentioned Shattered Viewpoint even once that I can see outside the vote itself.) Is your vote where you want it to be now? If so would you care to share your reasons?

UNVOTE: AGar
VOTE: KageLord for being the first person alphabetically by user name not to have posted since the game started.

How do we still have two players who haven't posted at all?

Mod: Can we please prod KageLord and tumescence?

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@Zajnet, interesting. How different would you say your voting AGar for lurking right at the start when you knew he wasn't is from Shattered Viewpoint's unvoting right at the start when he knew he wasn't voting? You seem to have found his action worth voting for but I'd call them pretty similar. Or was it other things about Shattered Viewpoint that you found scummy when you cast your vote?

re: attentiveness as a scum/town tell: It's my experience that attention to detail is more of a playstyle tell than anything else. People who pay attention will do so whether they're town or scum. People who don't won't. The reason that it's worth establishing how closely you can expect people to to watch is so that you've got a baseline for behavior. Scum could have motive (or scum buddies) that cause them to notice or not notice things that don't fit the rest of their pattern. Everyone else can think what they like in terms of tells but personally I find it useful just for establishing baselines.

@AGar, would you care to share what you were fishing for from StrangerCoug? I take it that his not giving it wasn't that much of a scum tell for you (if any) given that you're vote has stayed put.

@StrangerCoug, we're in a setup where we're certain that there are no other scum double voters or other things that could cause a legitimate danger of lynch at L-2. Assuming reasonable play there's no danger in putting people at L-1 and asking for a claim only when someone's ready to hammer. If we start getting close to deadlines then we can start pushing things but until then people should only be claiming when they're about to be lynched or when they have information they think it will be beneficial for the town to know. Today there shouldn't be any such information. I'm not sure what formula you might have been working with (I don't believe that I've heard of it) but there's no reason I can see to treat claims here any differently that they would be treated in the F11 setup. If others want to make a case to the contrary I'll listen but premature claiming mostly just helps the scum decide on their night kills.

@Paltry Excuse, why do you think scum wouldn't want to bandwagon?

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@AGar, how long is it reasonable to let people go in a game without contributing?

@Paltrey Excuse, I don't love Enigma's play by any stretch. Not moving his vote since his first post despite apparently finding things he dislikes at least enough to say that he dislikes them isn't great. He is mostly focused on theory which isn't what town should be doing. The part about StrangerCoug's knowing what the claim would be is a bit off. Right now I wouldn't mind if he got lynched at all. I've still got more from him than I do from tumescence though.

@tumescence, we're still waiting for that read and post. 4 words over 8 pages fails to impress me.

@Zajnet, so having a reason other than joking for doing something you know doesn't make sense or is otherwise unnecessary is scummy? I don't think I buy that.

UNVOTE: KageLord
VOTE: tumescence

I'd be willing to lynch any of the following if it came down to it right now without feeling the least bit bad: Chronopie, Enigma, silverbullet999, tumescence, Zajnet. That list could be longer without much trouble at all but it's already more players than there are scum.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@Paltry Excuse, the sum of tumescence's actions in the game thus far has been to promise content and not deliver. That's scummy. There's nothing redeeming to counter it with. That would make for a good vote in any ruleset.

@AGar, tumescence's participating here would be a great example of "without participating." I don't know that I'm interested in coming up with a definition that tries to cover all the loopholes but there are going to be cases when someone just isn't participating in a game that should be clear.

As far as lynch all lurkers goes, if we let people get away with lurking it gives scum incentive to lurk as it stops them from committing anything that can be taken as a tell. Town has a reason to participate regardless of the rest of the game (they should be trying to catch scum) whereas scum don't have any reason to participate other than to avoid looking scummy; if they don't even need to do that then it's in their best interest to lurk. If you're going to focus on scummy things that people have done and not take lack of participation into account then you're certainly going to find more scummy actions committed by active players than inactive players and you'll want to lynch them. Town, if active, will do things that come across as scummy sometimes.

We shouldn't need to resort to lynch all lurkers but we should actively punish lurking when it turns up. That forces scum to participate and makes them easier to catch in the long run.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

I had life come up for a bit there. I'll catch up and post my thoughts later this morning (PDT). Sorry about that absence.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

So at this point it looks like tumescence would still be a fine lynch so far as I'm concerned but given that apparently we'll be dealing with a replacement and there's no real drive for it I'll let it go for now. I'm going to expect content from that spot tomorrow.

I disagree with a lot of what Enigma is saying in terms of what he thinks is a case on me and the general theory idea but I'd also guess that he's more likely town than scum at this point. He both seems sincere and probably wouldn't bother making that particular move against me were he scum as I think that there should be paths of less resistance (and clearly he is sophisticated enough to recognize that as a decent choice for scum) that I'd expect him to be more likely to take.

Sotty7 is right when she says that Shattered Viewpoint has been much more in the background since the pressure came off. I don't care too much for that.

Between ConfidAnon and Zajnet I tend to find Zajnet scummier. Overall it feels like ConfidAnon has been more involved in what's happening the game and though he is agreeing with others a fair amount he's also asking questions (like what sets me apart from others) that I think town should be a bit more likely to ask than scum. Zajnet's distinction between his early vote and Shattered Viewpoint's unvote still feels artificial to me (obviously joking isn't a great reason to do something and I don't feel that Shattered Viewpoint having something else in mind was scummy.) I also don't really agree with his characterization of what I've had to say or that he's been trying to go with Enigma's posts on me but not take a stance on his own (he's got me at not scummy but not pro-town whereas Enigma clearly thinks I'm scummy) which feels like he's testing the waters to see if he can get a push going for me.

@silverbullet999, I put you on my no trouble with lynching list because your posts seem to be almost entirely unimportant, theory talk or reactions to being accused of things. I don't see you looking at that much that's happening in the game other than when people talk about you. Scum are more likely to do that than town and I don't feel as though you've been doing anything that helpful to offset it.

@Sotty7, the answer to why I included silverbullet999 on my list is largely above; I'd put his contributions towards scum hunting at about the same level as the others despite the fact that he's posted more. Beyond that, of those I've not talked about so far or not on my earlier list Col.Cathart is at the top of my list of scummy, more active players. I don't like his interactions with the Shattered Viewpoint wagon or Beefster in the early game and I'm having trouble seeing how he'd be helping the town with them. I don't mind the move to Enigma when he made it but it was a pretty easy one to make.

@Beefster, just so that it's clear (though it should have been by now) I put my rules of thumb for the newbie game setup in this game at the start because I think that everything that they say applies here. Hopefully everyone will follow them.

@Enigma, you seem to be going out of your way to excuse lack of content on the parts of players based on your reaction to me. Players might be busy and not show up at all for a stretch (I was busy during the past 4 days or so for example) but saying that you'll post content and then not doing it is active lurking and a scummy action. I'm also not willing to accept laziness as an excuse for not posting. If people are going to sign up to play these games then they should play them to win. As town getting people to give input and providing it yourself is important. If scum are given the chance to avoid doing that then they've got every reason to take it; town don't.

I'm certainly not saying that all lurkers will flip scum or that someone who's active has to be town though you're apparently inclined to misrepresent my posts that way. On the other hand, not only do I feel that we're more likely to find scum among lurkers than active players, eliminating non-participants earlier rather than later means that we're less likely to be hurt by them being hard to read and not contributing when we need to get things right.

When people don't post they don't make scum slips. Only scum hunting among the active players allows scum to get by with no attention and it punishes active town players (the more people post the more "slips" they'll seem to make regardless of alignment.) Putting pressure on lurkers (up to and including lynching them if they don't start getting into the game) should be part of town strategy.

You also seem to think that my votes indicate a push for someone to get lynched. If I vote for someone I'm not going to mind if they get lynched and at that point (and I probably think they're at least as good a lynch as everyone else) but I'm much more interested in seeing the reasons other people give for their votes than I am in trying to push for particular lynches for most of the game.

UNVOTE: tumescence
VOTE: Zajnet

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@sotty7, actually, I'm not convinced that the mod kills that would happen at this point would be a bad thing (especially when the kill rate for the game is taken into account.) I was planning on giving this till tomorrow morning and then coming to point that out and make sure we got a lynch. Given my stance on lurkers I couldn't particularly come in and not complain about them but the BaM ruleset is convenient for this particular use. You also didn't list them all but there's no one that's not posted today that I particularly want around tomorrow.

Now that we've got the cop claim (and faking that claim would have been a terrible move so there's no reason at all not to believe it) there's a particularly good wagon to go along with that which is nice.

I'll hold off if people want me to but I'd rather end the day sooner and thin the herd some.

In other news, of those I expect to be remaining after today, drmyshottizsik is probably my top guess for scum. I'll go into why tomorrow.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@Sotty7, not necessarily just one post. But I didn't want to give lurkers a heads up. Since you brought it up it became time for me to move.

This game has dead weight in it. I bet that includes at least one scum and I'm perfectly willing to have it trimmed via modkills. I also think that sooner is better than later for it to happen.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

@Sotty7, I don't deny that. I've been getting over being sick and not feeling energetic enough to give this game much attention as it's in a slow stage while we fumble around with initial play. Actually I probably won't be as in the game next week either as it's the final week of the quarter and I've got a fair amount of prep work to do with finals and then I'll be at Scumstorm over next weekend. None of that excuses my lack of presence up till now or the likely lesser presence next game day.

On the other hand, I can be proactive now. Thinking about it, I think it is time for some death.

VOTE: Chronopie

That should be the hammer. If this goes badly (beyond Chronopie) I'll deal with the fallout tomorrow but anyone who gets taken out with this is someone we should be getting rid of now.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

I'll be V/LA for the weekend but the good news is that the summer quarter has just ended and after Scumstorm I'll have much more time for mafia. Here's a quick thought and vote before I go.

VOTE: drmyshottyizsik

tumescence did essentially nothing of value while he was in the game. drmyshottyizsik came in to put Zajnet at L-1 without wanting to give any reasons, then fake-voted for Chronopie right off the next day for a collection of fairly weak reasons that look like they're an attempt to distance. That he then attacked curiouskarmadog for wanting others to vote the same way and then ignored Chronopie for the rest of the day until the cop claim (when he unvoted for no reason and simply voted him without comment) reinforces that impression.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Zorblag]

Congratulations scum, good work pushing through the victory after I let you down. Thanks for the great flavor and the modding Papa Zito and for the play from everyone else.

I'm certainly not pleased that I ended up getting mod killed (it was the correct decision under the BaM ruleset and there's no one to complain to about it but myself) but I'm not hugely distraught either; I had other things I was handling that were more important to me at the time. It does mean that I'm blacklisted from BaM ruleset games in the future but we can all live with that. I wasn't expecting that particular day to end so soon but I also really wasn't feeling up to playing any mafia at the time.

I went into the game with a well established point of view that the setup favored the scum and really, nothing in the game changed that. Even if the F11 setup is balanced on it's own doubling the number of both scum and town isn't a good way to preserve that balance. I sort of think that it might be more balanced if it was simply a 3 man scum team from the start and the same distribution of power roles (which is close to what my being mod-killed reduced it to given that there weren't a tracker and watcher in the game) but it would still be pretty long. The short deadlines were certainly a good thing for this game but somehow with a game this size it would be pretty helpful to have another source of kills (town or third party) just to get through some of the excess players.

In any case, good luck to everyone in future games!

-Zorblag R`Lyeh