Micro 431 - Noughts and Crosses Mafia

[Scripten]

Alright, so the way I see it is that we have two viable lynches today. (We could technically go for Equinox/Scripten, but I think Equinox is town and my townread of myself is implicit. I assume that if Vettrock is scum, he will probably try to fight the lynch by pushing either Equinox or me.) No matter what, both players in {Mathdino, Vettrock} or {Equinox, Scripten} will die today/tonight. Our lynch tomorrow will be chosen by our lynch today, as well, because of the rules of TTT. So, we have to choose either of the following configurations:

T-Bone	Belisarius	X Mathdino
X Kaboose	0 Pine	0 vettrock
Equinox	Scripten	X RedCoyote

or

T-Bone	Belisarius	0 Mathdino
Kaboose	0 Pine	X vettrock
X Equinox	Scripten	X RedCoyote

Now, you've probably noticed that the second version requires that I get NK'd, since otherwise scum will lose come my lynch. That means that the only possible LyLo configuration, assuming scum is not in {Mathdino, Vettrock, Equinox} is going to be Belisarius, Kaboose, and T-Bone.

On the other hand, the first version gives scum the power to choose who goes into LyLo, but only out of {T-Bone, Belisarius, Equinox, Scripten}. (Since it's LyLo, anyway, TTT rules stop mattering during the scum NK.) I personally like this option better because it puts significantly more townreads of mine into LyLo, which is a Good Thing.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

VOTE: Mathdino

[Kaboose]

If everyone is fine with Mathdino today, assume a NK on Vettrock, and then blocking with me, I'll give intent to hammer to further the town's desired course of action.

I'm still looking at some people though, more so the ones who aren't going to come under any form of lynch or NK because of this plan of action.

This path gives us T-Bone, Belisarius, and Scripten on the final day.

Personally, I don't like Belisarius.

[Kaboose]

Actually I was looking at the wrong square. It would give us T-Bone, Equinox, and one Belisarius or Scripten.

[Scripten]

Actually I was looking at the wrong square. It would give us T-Bone, Equinox, and one Belisarius or Scripten.

Hm? Scum don't have to choose between just us. They can also hit the corners, since it will be LyLo and TTT rules won't matter.

[Mathdino]

UNVOTE: Mathdino

I'M JUST GONNA
PRETEND THAT WAS A REACTION TEST
AND READ OVER THE GAME ONCE MORE
>.>
<.<
>.>

[Kaboose]

Yeah, you're right. I guess at that point it won't matter.

[Kaboose]

Anyone else not liking Belisarius?

XTX
XMX
XXT

Doesn't put us in any worse position, and we can still end with a 3 person lylo like we are now.

I don't like Belisarius at all.

[Belisarius]

You'll like me fine when Vet flips scum.

[Mathdino]

T-Bone	Belisarius	X Mathdino
X Kaboose	0 Pine	0 vettrock
Equinox	Scripten	X RedCoyote

I don't understand how TTT rules stop mattering once we hit LyLo. If scum NK a side, we just lynch the corner and win. No, they're forced between T-Bone and Equinox and honestly I think they'll hit Equinox.

[Mathdino]

EBWOP: If scum NK a side, we just lynch the other side and win.

I think we need to start planning for LyLo. Assume me, vettrock, and Kaboose flip town. Now us 3 are the conftownies deciding between the remaining 4.

Does anyone see merit in the idea that T-Bone quickhammered his partner for towncred?

[Mathdino]

The first lynch of the game

RedCoyote (5) - Kaboose, Equinox, Scripten, Belisarius, T-Bone
Pine (1) - RedCoyote
T-Bone (1) - Mathdino

Note Voting:, Pine, vettrock
Five votes to lynch.
(expired on 2014-12-25 09:48:12)

Every last one of them was on the RC lynch, so scum must've bussed.

[Kaboose]

How exactly do we "just lynch a corner and win?"

The reason it stops mattering is because if we follow through with the Mathdino lynch... And we don't hit a scum ever.

XXT
TMM
XXT

That's what we'll get to during N3, they can kill whoever. We won't be able to win with TTT, and it won't matter if we block or don't block because once we lynch, if we're wrong, it'll be 1 townie and 1 scum left going in to N4. My money would be on the scum to win that N4 exchange.

[Mathdino]

Oh yeah you're right, I'm dumb, sorry.

My current lynch order for the remaining 4 is T-Bone -> Equinox -> Belisarius -> Scripten. Will explain why in a sec.

Kaboose, go over those 4 with me, we should come to an agreement.

[Empking]

The busiest vote count of Day Two so far

Mathdino (2) - Belisarius, Scripten

Note Voting: Equinox, T-Bone, Kaboose, Mathdino, vettrock
Four votes to lynch.
(expired on 2014-12-30 04:54:50)

[Mathdino]

Center square isn't necessary to win a game so I wouldn't count on scum autolynching Pine, especially if his reads are off.

Actually, this is crazy WIFOM so please disregard. Math is right; scum will probably hit conftown/center square. No need to really setup spec any more than this. Anyone who doesn't follow, read this: How to never lose at tic tac toe (but not how to always win)

Kind of a meh towntell but the 'scum autolynching' is a town mindset. And the mind switching on whether scum would kill Pine; keep in mind that scum probably talked before D1 so they probably already had a plan come daystart.

Hey guys, I think Pine is town for including himself in his own lynchpool.

Regardless, I very much don't expect to be townread for setup spec, since that's pretty easy to fake and if the game's full of smart people (case and point: Kaboose

), it's probably gonna get broken anyway.

Scumhunting > setup spec. SS is just something to talk about at the beginning and a good way to structure the game.

This is actually more town to me than any of Math's other posts, ironically.

Quoting this to just talk about his read on me, I appreciate that he didn't just immediately dole out a Math-town read like most people do when I get active. This read flows very naturally.

Our best bet is to take a corner, that gives us options. I think it should be RedCoyote. This is just the reaction I was resting for.the opportunity to lynch an Innocdnt Child who's willing to go is just too much a temptation

Vote RedCoyote

I was legitimately hoping this was what you were doing. I'm okay with this.

UNVOTE: Mathdino
VOTE: RedCoyote

This is L-1.

Probably one of the towniest things. Scripten made no indication it was a reaction test and I think we can take him at his word that he thought it was since he didn't really comment on Pine's plan much. He went with it and sheeped Pine's results.

In other news, vettrock is pinging me weirdly.

Have you played with Vettrock before?

***

(89) reads strangely for me.

Kaboose:

You wrote a lot about how that one particular quote was problematic, but that post just feels like fluff and posturing. Why aren't you voting for RedCoyote right now?

Good anti sensationalism on vettrock, good thing to point out with Kaboose.

UNVOTE: Mathdino

Hold up a second. I'm going to do a quick once-over before we lynch.

And lastly, the reread.

Scripten is strongest townread in my book.

[Mathdino]

Speaking of which, RedCoyote, Equinox, and Vettrock are all missing. I find this troubling, considering lurking scum did quite well in the last game of this setup. I know vettrock is a town lurker, but the other two I know nothing of.

This game started literally 6 hours ago.

I don't know about you Tic-Tac-Toe strategists, but I'm starting to think that we have a better chance at winning by lynching scum rather than picking squares, especially when Pine is in the center. To start, there are already some obvtown players, so scum will have to choose between someone actively thinking and posting in the game who is universally read as town and someone who isn't leading the thread nearly as much but is confirmed town. I don't know about you, but having an innocent child in LyLo as scum isn't the worst thing in the world.

Vote: RedCoyote

Semi-RVS vote on a fellow 6-hour lurker omg because there's a large swath of the player list I'm not very interested in lynching at the moment.

Preview edit: What T-Bone said more elegantly.

This post reads pretty town, also the nuanced view on a Pine kill.

Okay, everyone stopped laughing? Hear me out. If we do this, we retain control the entire game. The scumteam never force us into lynching anyone with their kills because we have the center square. Every lynch we do will effectively control the scumkill as well because otherwise they lose. For instance, say we lynch Pine and scum kill me. We can lynch anyone except T-Bone and force the scum's hand. If we then lynch, say, vettrock, then the scum have to kill Kaboose. If Kaboose isn't killed, he's confirmed scum. If Kaboose is killed, this doesn't help the scum get any closer to winning on the board. Then we can lynch, say, Mathdino, and the same thing applies to Equinox.

Lynching the center square is like giving us two free investigations, I think. Granted, we have to sacrifice our IC to get it, but if we don't lynch Pine today, the scum will kill him tonight and we'll be stuck chasing the scum around the board.

[...]

I always have the long game in mind. I think playing for the right now can be dangerous and naive because it's not guaranteed that we're going to hit scum in the first two days, Belisarius, no matter how confident you think you/we are.

I will argue the opposite. It's true that it's necessary to have the long game in mind, especially with something like this where there are two win conditions in play, but there's also the danger of completely losing the advantages of playing the short game. Day 1 is arguably the best day to get reads because there is more spontaneity on the part of everyone. The evidence of that is already apparent in this thread. We lose that the second we decide to lynch the center square and move to Night. While I like the idea of having those free investigations, doing that at the cost of the interactions from Today does not make a fair trade.

Hypothetically speaking, if Pine became a non-presence in the thread and/or misread the scum while Mathdino-town continued to stomp all over the thread and eat scum like grass, would center square be worth the risk of Mathdino lynching one of them (or even the other of them) the following Day?

Lynching Pine is not as obvious of an answer as you make it to be.

Meanwhile I'm questioning whether we should view this as coaching, seeing as Equinox appears to make no effort to discern RC's alignment from all this. The NK makes no indication that Equinox was following this proposed scum strategy but that's easily WIFOMable. I'm not sure what to think and I think we need Equinox's reads in here.

Kaboose, vettrock, thoughts?

[vettrock]

I think either Belisaruis or Tbone is scum. I know I am town, and I am getting town reads from mathdino. My optimal lynch would be Equinox, only because that sets up the Belisarius lynch. If we have to go my way, I prefer Mathdino over me as I see Equinox as town. I think most likely this us going to head into 3p Lylo where Tbone us the scum.

VOTE: Equinox

To be clear I think Equinox is town, but the path to the scum leads through him.

[Mathdino]

Not exactly helpful. Why is Belisarius scum?

What's your explanation of T-Bone's behaviour?

[vettrock]

Also, I am considering the T-bone lynch as well. If we lynch T-bone, scum will Nk one of the four sides, whichever one does not have scum opposite. So if the kill me, we have to lynch Kaboose, and we are in 3p LyLo. The disadvantage here is if T-bone is not scum, we are headed to 3p lylo with the two town that scum chooses, whereas with either mathdino, myself, Equinox or scripten, we have the potential to kill one of the scum out of the possible town insread of the squares scum cooses for us after a T-bone.

[Mathdino]

My fear is if we lynch T-Bone we'll pretty much be left with Kaboose, vettrock, and whichever of me and Equinox that scum wants in LyLo (my money's on Equinox, no offence).

I don't like that.

[Belisarius]

My fear is if we lynch T-Bone we'll pretty much be left with Kaboose, vettrock, and whichever of me and Equinox that scum wants in LyLo

It's even simpler than that: if we lynch T-Bone and he's not scum, we lose. Scum will just use their NK to direct our lynches onto townies.

[Mathdino]

Bit sensational for my tastes.

If we lynch T-Bone, scum controls the lynches until LyLo. In essence scum will make it between you and Scripten and Kaboose and vettrock, assuming Equinox is town. If we try to pick our own lynch before that, we do indeed lose.

Let's all assume I'll be lynched and Kaboose and vettrock are dead in the water.

Now what? Thoughts on Equinox/Scripten/T-Bone, Beli?

[Belisarius]

The only way I'll believe Equinox and Scripten could be scum is if they flip that way or everyone but the two of them and me is dead and the game isn't over.

T-Bone, as I've said, is my second strongest scumread after vet.

[Mathdino]

The only way I'll believe Equinox and Scripten could be scum is if they flip that way or everyone but the two of them and me is dead and the game isn't over.

inb4 "that can be arranged"

[Mathdino]

I don't understand the hard defending of Equinox. He's had all of two posts, one of which can very much be interpreted as coaching the scumbuddy. Please explain.