Mini 560: Methodical Mafia 2 -- GAME OVER

[Ectomancer]

Ecto, my list was made before it was apparent that you'd be lynched first. And I have noted that I've found Yos mildly scummy. If it looks like a guarantee that you'll be lynched first, though, I'll probably reconsider my placement of Yos, perhaps moving him down a couple spots. I don't think it'll ultimately make a huge difference, though.

Fair enough.

[Mr Stoofer]

Current ballots

:

[col]

andersonw

Max
Oman
Ectomancer
VanDamian
Nocmen
Opie
Sarcastro
Thesp
Skruffs
Yosarian2
Shy Guy

[col]

Ectomancer

VanDamien
Thesp
Skruffs
andersonw
opie
Oman
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Max
Shy Guy
Yosarian2

[col]

Max

Shy Guy
Sarcastro
Ectomancer
Yosarian2
andersonw
opie
Thesp
Oman
VanDamien
Skruffs
Nocmen

[col]

Nocmen

Ectomancer
Oman
Sarcastro
Thesp
VanDamien
andersonw
Max
Yosarian2
Skruffs
Shy Guy
opie

[col]

Oman

Nocmen
Max
Shy Guy
Sarcastro
opie
Ectomancer
Skruffs
VanDamien
Thesp
Yosarian2
andersonw

[col]

opie

Ectomancer
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Oman
Skruffs
VanDamien
andersonw
Thesp
Max
Yosarian2
Shy Guy

Sarcastro

Ectomancer
Yosarian2
Nocmen
Max
andersonw
Oman
Thesp
VanDamien
opie
ShyGuy
Skruffs

[col]

Shy Guy

Max
VanDamien
Oman
Thesp
Ectomancer
Nocmen
Sarcastro
andersonw
Skruffs
Yosarian2
opie

[col]

Skruffs

Ectomancer
shy guy
VanDamien
Nocmen
Oman
andersonw
Sarcastro
Max
Thesp
Yosarian2
opie

[col]

Thesp

Max
Nocmen
Yosarian2
andersonw
Sarcastro
Shy Guy
Ectomancer
opie
Skruffs
Oman
VanDamien

[col]

VanDamian

Ectomancer
Yosarian2
Shy Guy
Max
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Oman
opie
andersonw
Thesp
Skruffs

[col]

Yosarian2

VanDamien
Thesp
Skruffs
andersonw
opie
Oman
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Max
Ectomancer
Shy Guy

We are now in the deadline window. Day 0 will end without further notice at some point before

Friday 14th March

.

It is vital that you ensure that your votes are correctly recorded in the "Current ballots" summary.

[Ectomancer]

Ok mathematicians and graph wizards. Lets take a look at this idea and see if we can draw some groups together by forcing a play. I'd like to know whether we could force patterns to emerge, that might narrow our scum pool down.

Assumption #1: Scum has their list prepared properly. Oh, they might shift people around a bit, but in ways that wont affect the overall outcome.

Assumption #2: 2 of the scum are working together with their ballots to get the 3rd into the bottom 2. 1 of these 2 scum might also be working together with the 3rd scum to get the 1st scum into the bottom 3 as well.

Question: What would happen if we forced

everyone

to choose 2 completly different people that they believe to be town, to be in their bottom 2? If in the above equation, we labeled them scum #1, #2, and #3, they would need to change roles, so that #3 becomes #2, #2 becomes #1 and #1 becomes #3 (or reverse that).
That would create a pattern in our ballots that might be discernible.

Question #2: If the above act would create a pattern, would not doing it twice further refine that pattern?
Answer to Question #2: Yes, but not if Scum knows another will follow (or can arrange one).

Problem: This would only truly be effective if we ordered a lockdown on the bottom 2 candidates. If scum can change those later, they wont have to make sure their ballot is good again. They can slip someone else in to spoil the pattern, then slip their candidate back in again at the 11th hour.

Viable?

[Skruffs]

apologiges for not getting that run down done, i was ambushed by a surprise moving away party sunday and ... well i'm still a little drunk, don't tell my boss...we enter our deadline range today so it's time for all of us to make sure this game gets high priority, if you didn't alleady i need to catch up but expect a nother post asap.

[Skruffs]

Skruffs, why, exactally, should a pro-town person be willing to get himself lynched? It seems like if you're in a position where you might get to the top 2 or 3, and you know you're pro-town, then if you can stay there that greatly increases the town's chances of winning, right? Or am I missing something?

Sure, it might, but if you let that blind yourself you fall into a trap that everyone seems to ignore; even if you know you are town and everyone else believes you are town it DOESN'T mean that who you think is scum is more likely to be scum. Like with Shy Guy offering to 'help me' get to final two : Why would I be at all interested in getting to final two with him if I was not sure that he was scum?

I understand the hesitation everyone has with my own personal ideals, that martyrs who are tryign to force the town to vote a certain way should show good faith by offering to be the first off, IF the people they want to be saved for final two are agreed to by the rest of the town. But that's how I feel, and I feel that it would wind up being WORSE for scum than it would be for town. You have to remember that everyone voted out before the final two does not matter in the long run; scum are going to be trying to get one of their own into final two and town is basically trying to avoid that. So makign it harder for scum to get to final two is, in my opinion, in town's best interests.

(reading on...)

[Skruffs]

Ludicrous statement. There has never been a time in this game where you could possibly suggest that a scum team has no chance of winning. Which gambit of Ectoscum do you suppose failed so catastrophically as to cause me to "give up"? Are you kidding me? Go read some Ectomancer games. I'm not stupid. An easygoing, rational, game mechanic posting (it's an active lurker move) Ectoscum could slide into a 3rd - 5th position

easily

in this game. From that position I can win this game as scum.

I remember you from Clue 2, where you were the last SK and was trying to do anything in your power to get a townie lynched so you and the last SK could fudge a win, although all options were lined against you. Inasmuch, I wouldn't expect you to 'give up', and I also know that you have no problem with pulling ludicrous gambits.

Also, you are wrong; 3rd-5th place is a loss for mafia unless you got your buddy (who you seem to be overly implying is Yosarian) into 1st or 2nd.

No doubt in my mind.

Unless

my ability to manipulate the ballot is compromised by town blocs (if they are lucky enough to build a solid one), or random moves that screw up my balloting by removing this player in round 3 insteablahblahblah

The main contention against you is your heavy-handed attempts to force town to agree with you in regards to who the town players are, without discussion, nad with threats to people who go against your schematics. Scum early-forcing a 'town scum' condition wind up getting around the 'town block' thing you are referring to; the town block is only a detriment if it is entirely made of scum.

The only claim that you might make to support the idea that I am scum, is if you said I am purposely choosing 2 townies (Sarcastro and Yosarian2) and forcing them into the middle of the pack by my play.

That claim has been made.

It doesn't take them out of play, but it should remove 2 townies from the possible players that will end up in the bottom 3.
That way, instead of town having a 9 in 12 shot of getting into one of those positions, they now have a 7 in 10 shot of getting into one. (Drop from 75% to 70%)

And if you were to agree to be lynched, it would drop to a 6/9.

Yosarian was randomly chosen, not be me, but by an alphabetical list, and the fact the the first couple players posted it that way.

so you say.

Sarcastro was chosen for his gameplay, and a way to hedge my bet on Yosarian2. Pick a townie to keep in, and pick a scumbag to keep out.

But it can also be used as vice versa. Sarc had little to no chance of getting to final two before you started faux fighting with him. Choosing someone that some people already have expressed concerns about and declaring him as scum seems to be you trying to appeal to the majority. Your later statement that you aren't interested in arguing over why he is scum just kinda pushes that motif further. Sstill, you are not getting to final 2, and your wifom regarding yosarian and sarc seems to be pretty successful.

(more later)

[Ectomancer]

Ludicrous statement. There has never been a time in this game where you could possibly suggest that a scum team has no chance of winning. Which gambit of Ectoscum do you suppose failed so catastrophically as to cause me to "give up"? Are you kidding me? Go read some Ectomancer games. I'm not stupid. An easygoing, rational, game mechanic posting (it's an active lurker move) Ectoscum could slide into a 3rd - 5th position

easily

in this game. From that position I can win this game as scum.

I remember you from Clue 2, where you were the last SK and was trying to do anything in your power to get a townie lynched so you and the last SK could fudge a win, although all options were lined against you. Inasmuch, I wouldn't expect you to 'give up', and I also know that you have no problem with pulling ludicrous gambits.

I think here you support my statement. It wasn't me that said I was giving up my cause as lost. I cant remember who I was responding to at the time, but saying that I gave up my cause as hopeless does not jive with my playstyle at all.
The point in this particular case, is that I wasn't even remotely in trouble at anytime to cause me to throw out the ideas and theories that I have. I could have a scummy motive to what I'm doing, sure (though as Yos has pointed out, I dont see how it would benefit Ectoscum). But attributing my actions to giving up? No.

[Ectomancer]

Your other points were hashed out later. I'll see your later responses to those when you catch up.

[Yosarian2]

Yosarian2 is lynched day 10.

opie and Shy Guy remain.

Ok, that's fine by me. I'm not 100% sure about opie, but all in all, I think we could do a lot worse. No ballot changes from me unless I need to respond to someone else's changes, I think.

Something that bugs me is that if scum don't have someone making it into the final two right now, they have no reason NOT to be frantically changing their ballots -- Day 0 is our only time for voting and impacting the game, and it now could end any time; it doesn't matter how scummy we find the ballot changers, if they don't change their ballots and there isn't scum in the bottom two (currently that means opie would have to be scum -- or me but I'm not) they lose. So the fact that there hasn't been a massive flurry worries me, it indicates the scum might be winning.

Maybe this is just paranoia on my part -- maybe the scum are Max Oman and VanDamien and they are just screwed, and that's why there isn't a flurry of ballot changes. But since there isn't, either scum are out of reach of winning, or ARE winning, and the second prospect worries me greatly.

Eh...I wouldn't let yourself get too tied up in knots with that kind of thinking. Sure, the deadline might happen any time now, but it also might not happen for 11 days, and if the scum make any sudden scummy vote changes now, they might give themselves away; they might be waiting for their moment when they can either find a good excuse to change their votes; it all depends on what kind of russian roulette they feel like playing.

Or, the scum might be lurking, might be someone like Andrew and Van Damien and someone else. Or they might be hoping to get people to second guess themselves like you are right now, or they might be expecting townies to make some more changes before the deadline. Could be any number of things.

Now, like I said, I'm not 100% sure that Opie is town, but I don't think it's necessarally a good idea to second guess yourself in a situation like this just based on speculation about what the scum might want to do, especally with a wierd factor like the highly uncertain deadline.

[opie]

@Shy Guy: After I signed up and before it started I did a quick read of Methodical Mafia 1 to get an idea of the game was played, since it was such a unique mechanic. I thought the rules were the same between the two games. In Methodical Mafia 1, there were night choices. After Day Zero, there were lynches and night choices.

[Skruffs]

I have caught up but now have to leave work... I'm not sure, I need to really look at shy guy, opie and yosarian. I also need to look at the people Ectomancer has kind of avoided so far this game. I intend to change myt ballot tonight but i will post a pseudoballot first, and if five or so people agree I will change it.

Right now there's too much to process to just outright respond to the last two pages, but i don't like nocmen's post, and I *don't* *know* *why*...

[Shy Guy]

I don't find Ectomancer's suggestion to be viable.

Yosarian2, I find it interesting that you say that you are OK with not being in the final two -- that could be you just saying that to make me think you are more town though. I find it odd that you aren't more desirous of being in the final two. I'm also incredibly paranoid about your whole post -- what if you and opie are scum together? Then you'd be very OK with opie being bottom two instead of you, and you'd be perfectly fine keeping it that way. Then again, you could just be a townie who finds me and opie to be townish and are trying to give me good solid advice. Oh, mafia makes me go insane sometmes...

Yosarian2, explicitly, what do you think about Skruffs, and why?

opie's explanation makes sense.

[Yosarian2]

Well, it goes without saying that I'd rather be in the top two, obv. However, I'm pretty sure you're pro-town, and opie seems pretty pro-town to me at the moment; I think the odds of you both being pro-town are high enough that I'm not really interested in rocking the boat right now.

[Ectomancer]

I don't find Ectomancer's suggestion to be viable.

It was laid out in a straightforward manner. Do you have logic to back your offhanded opinion? Did you even try to work out the permutations?

[andersonw]

Assumption #1: Scum has their list prepared properly. Oh, they might shift people around a bit, but in ways that wont affect the overall outcome.

Assumption #2: 2 of the scum are working together with their ballots to get the 3rd into the bottom 2. 1 of these 2 scum might also be working together with the 3rd scum to get the 1st scum into the bottom 3 as well.

Question: What would happen if we forced

everyone

to choose 2 completly different people that they believe to be town, to be in their bottom 2? If in the above equation, we labeled them scum #1, #2, and #3, they would need to change roles, so that #3 becomes #2, #2 becomes #1 and #1 becomes #3 (or reverse that).
That would create a pattern in our ballots that might be discernible.

Question #2: If the above act would create a pattern, would not doing it twice further refine that pattern?
Answer to Question #2: Yes, but not if Scum knows another will follow (or can arrange one).

Problem: This would only truly be effective if we ordered a lockdown on the bottom 2 candidates. If scum can change those later, they wont have to make sure their ballot is good again. They can slip someone else in to spoil the pattern, then slip their candidate back in again at the 11th hour.

Viable?

First of all, the scum do not know when the 11th hour is because Mr. Stoofer said that the deadline was unknown to everyone.
It's also not possible for everyone to choose two different people because some of those people would overlap and the scum could just overlap their two most townie people, so I don't think it's viable unless if I misunderstood your idea.
And I don't understand how we can do it twice, either.

[Thesp]

Code: Select all

Shy Guy
Max
Nocmen
Yosarian2
andersonw
Ectomancer
Sarcastro
opie
Skruffs
Oman
VanDamien

Moving Shy Guy to he top, moving Sarcastro down one.

And I don't feel that what I am doing is at all active lurking, I'm already very sure that Ecto is scum, and I'm trying to get discussion towards the other problems that I found when making my ballot regarding who is scum, and this could make or break the game for the town, especially because we don't know when the deadline is. It could be tomorrow.

Who else do you think is scum? Ignore Ecto for a moment - who else is do you think is scum? (I agree with Yosarian2 that I find it very unlikely he's scum, and the only reason I'm not sinking him lower is my fear that Yosarian2 is, and Ecto has his ballot.)

I find Thesp's latest posts disingenuous. His voting seemed to move me and Yosarian2 up for little reason, and when I asked him about it, he responded to the other part of my post, but not the part about me & Yosarian2 vs. me & opie vs. me & Skruffs.

I didn't think it worth commenting on. After all, when I've been unable to reproduce precisely why I feel VanDamien's approach was more townlike than yours (though note that Sarcastro has seen the same), you've skewered me for it. Why bother here?

I'd be very suspicious from now on if someone drastically alters their ballot without very good reasoning, and would likely alter my ballot to countermand theirs.

Does this set up red flags for anyone else?

He's strenuously arguing for the status quo

largely because he's in the bottom two

, and is outright threatening towards anyone who is uncomfortable with it.

This is precisely the sort of thing that mafia would want to do in this position, if they're one of the final two.

I can understand that town might make the same comment, but it coupled with creeping uncertainty of Shy Guy, this worries me greatly. I'm moving him to the top of my list with prejudice - I don't think Shy Guy should be in the bottom two, and his insistence that things not change worries me greatly, especially as seen here:

In general, I am very comfortable and pleased with my ballot, and especially since I think it is bad in general to change late (and will be suspicious of those who make significant changes late) I am going to leave it for now.

This is a thinly veiled threat towards anyone who thinks Shy Guy should not be in the last two, as is this:

Something that bugs me is that if scum don't have someone making it into the final two right now, they have no reason NOT to be frantically changing their ballots -- Day 0 is our only time for voting and impacting the game, and it now could end any time; it doesn't matter how scummy we find the ballot changers, if they don't change their ballots and there isn't scum in the bottom two (currently that means opie would have to be scum -- or me but I'm not) they lose. So the fact that there hasn't been a massive flurry worries me, it indicates the scum might be winning.

It poisons the well, and it suggests not only that if there's anyone who challenges the status quo, they are likely to be scum, but that it should cement the idea that Shy Guy is town. I don't like it one bit.

(For the record, I have recently discovered that I despise this game concept and would not play in another such - I need a few results from dead people to determine ties between players.)

I still strongly, strongly support VanDamien as one of the last two (as I trust him way the heck more than any of you), and would recommend people give it serious consideration.

[Ectomancer]

We dont want to do it twice.

Do you honestly believe that scum is holding out until the 11th hour? When the 11th hour is when we are [/i]most[/i] interested in altered ballots? I dont buy that arguement. Balloting has settled down, and we are experience very minor adjustments.

You clearly dont understand the idea, or the concept. Everyone chooses 2 different people

than their current bottom 2

.

Do you understand? I believe scum already has their buddies in place. The play backs my statement. The stigma of 11th hour vote changes also supports my statement.
So, if they already have buddies in the bottom, they would have to put the

other

buddy in the bottom. You would find a person near the bottom, putting a person who previously voted them near the bottom. Then, the other scum who also voted for the one near the bottom, will switch his vote to the other scum, so that he and the previous bottom scum are now voting together for the other partner. Do you see?

Let say it looks like this:


town
town
scum #1
town
scum #2
town
town
scum#3
town

Scum #1 and #2 have #3 at the bottom of their lists.
Now we force a change:

#1 now puts #2 at the bottom. #3 also puts #2 at the bottom.

That my friends makes a pattern in the static. Strings can be connected logically. It wont solve anything for us, but it will give us more than tripe. See below for why it still makes sense if scum wont cooperate.

If they dont, they will have to depend upon town to help them out by putting one of them in the bottom. It makes things harder on them. It also means they may have to hold off putting in their final ballot until the 11th hour, but as you said, nobody knows when exactly that might be, right? Makes it harder for scum yet again.

So yeah Andersonw and ShyGuy, I dont think you've actually looked at the idea, or maybe just didnt understand it.

[Thesp]

I actually like what Ectomancer is suggesting, but time worries me right now - I'm afraid too many people would stall.

[Skruffs]

I find Opie to seem to be pro-town, as I have said before. I think so mostly because of one of the mistakes he made on an earlier page; it was near the top. I don't remember what exactly the mistake was, but it struck me as a genuine one about hte setup of the game, and I've been remembering that.

I'm not quite as sure abuot Shy Guy, and I'm wary about his attempts to get me to put him at bottom two and his cuonter offer; as I think we are all aware, it doesn't matter if ONE townie makes it to final two. TWO townies have to. I don't think that him putting me at the bottom will significantly affect my own chances to get further down, so now I am wondering, why does he want me to put him further down. Would it affect the game?


If I were to optimize (for example) my ballot to keep everyone who has me lower down, lower down, and putting everyone who has me higher up, higher up, this is how it would look like:

max 2nd
ecto 3rd
yos 3rd
opie 5th
oman 7th
noc 9th
andersonw 9th
thesp 9th
sarc 11th
van 11th
shyguy 9th*

I would put them in the order that I find most to least scummy, in the cases of ties to get those results

Shy guy wants me to put him at the final two, which is why he is out of place in this situation, I am goign to assume if I did he would keep his word on that.

I am in the middle of processing, Thesp, Grr, I am taking your ballot change but I am not going to do anymore that come after this post (I put the modified ballots after each round int he preview menu while I do it)

Expecct the run down and analysis in half an hour; Stoofer should be asleep right now (he's in europe) so I am counting on having another few hours (at least) of free time before he wakes up....

[Skruffs]

Rd1:
Ecto* 1111
Max* 111
Van* 11
Shy* 11
Noc* 1

*Shy guy not eliminated in first round(different)
Nocmen eliminated

Ecto 1111
Max 1111
Van 11
Shy 11
Van, Shy eliminated

Ecto 11111
Max 1111111
Max lynched Day 1

Day 2
Ecto 11111
Van 111
Oman* 1
Noc 1
Shy 1
Noc, Shy, Oman Eliminated
Ecto 11111111
Van 111
Ecto Lynched Day 2

Day 3
Yos* 111
Oman 11
Nocman* 11
Van 11
Shy 1
Shy GUy eliminated(Thesp)
Yos 111
Nocman 111
Oman 11
Van 11
Oman, Van elimmed (and,*noc,*yos,shy)
Yos 1111
Nocman 111111
Nocman lynched Day 3 (Anderson, Shy Guy deciding votes)
(I didn't do this for the first two rounds but am gonig to do it from now on, it's intriguing to see who's votes 'moves' the most). Nocman is lynched on his first 'appearance' in the votecount, also interesting.

Also interesting to note, the first three lynchs, my 'improved' voting list has all three people as in the top of my ballot (for the first two) and fourth from the top (Nocmen) so it could be said that I am going with teh flow by doing this. ... Oh well.
Day 4
Yos 111
Shy 11
Van 11
Oman 1 (ander)
Sarc* 1 (opie)

Oman, Sarc elimmed
Van 1111 (went from least popular to most)
Yos 111
Shy 11 <- elimmed (Thesp, Oman)
--
Van 11111(Oman)
Yos 1111
Oman breaks the tie and 'hammers' Van, who is second from the bottom on my 'improved' list.
-------
Day 5
Oman 11
Shy Guy 11
Yos 11
Sarc 1(opie)
Thesp* 1(Yos)
opie's still pushing a 'lost cause' on Sarc at this point, and is roudned up again.
Sarc, Thesp dropped
Oman 1111
Yos 11
Shy Guy 11
In the last previous round where either Shy and Yos had a different number of votes, Yos had 4, shy guy had 0, so Shy is dropped (Thesp and Oman's)
Oman 1111
Yos 1111 Brought up to a tie, interesting, since Oman had mre votes in a previous round, Yosarian is dropped, and Oman is lynched. (Right?) (3rd on my list at that point)
--------
Day 6
Yos 11
Thesp 11
Opie* 1 (and)
Sarc 1 (opie)
Shy Guy 1 (Thesp)
Opie, Sarc, Shy are dropped
Yos 111
Thesp 1111

Thesp is lynched, it is interesting because if Thesp had ben voting Sarc (his next higher up 'viable' candidate), it would have gone like this:

Yos 11
Thesp 11
Sarc 11
Opie* 1 (and)
Opie is dropped, ANderson votes Sarcastro
Sarc 111
Yos 11
Thesp 11
Yos has more votes in a previous round (the end of the last day) and is kept while Thesp is dropped
Sarc 11111
Yos 11
Sarc is lynched instead of Thesp, all because Thesp has Shy Guy above Sarc. Odd, huh
Anyways, originally Thesp was lynched, let's go with that
---------
Day 7
Sarc 11
Yos 11
Opie 1 (And)
Skruffs* 1 (Yos)
Side note, Anderson is the last person to show up on a vote count, though he is not anywhere close to the bottom of anyone's vote count lists.
Me, Opie dropped
Sarc 1111
Yos 11
Sarc lynched.
-----------
Day 8
Opie 1(ander)
Skruffs 11
Yos 1(me)
Ander* 1(Shy)
Yos with most points is kept, other two dropped
Skruffs 1111
Yos 1
Me lynched, day 8, which is the exact same as it is now.
----------
Day 9
Opie 1
Ander 111
Anderson is lynched, after providing more swing votes than anyone else.
-----------
Yos is lynched 2-1 Opie, andOpie and Shy guy, again, make it to final two.

I will analyze in the next post, but I will note that Anderson seems to serve no purpose in this game except to vote later; I'm going to see who 'benefits' the most from each lynching (IE who's got the lynchee highest/lowest on their charts)

[Skruffs]

Current ballots

:

[col]

andersonw

Max
Oman
Ectomancer
VanDamian
Nocmen

Opie

Sarcastro
Thesp
Skruffs
Yosarian2

Shy Guy

[col]

Ectomancer

VanDamien
Thesp
Skruffs
andersonw

Opie

Oman
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Max

Shy Guy

Yosarian2

[col]

Max

Shy Guy

Sarcastro
Ectomancer
Yosarian2
andersonw

Opie

Thesp
Oman
VanDamien
Skruffs
Nocmen

[col]

Nocmen

Ectomancer
Oman
Sarcastro
Thesp
VanDamien
andersonw
Max
Yosarian2
Skruffs

Shy Guy

Opie

[col]

Oman

Nocmen
Max

Shy Guy

Sarcastro

Opie

Ectomancer
Skruffs
VanDamien
Thesp
Yosarian2
andersonw

[col]

Opie

Ectomancer
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Oman
Skruffs
VanDamien
andersonw
Thesp
Max
Yosarian2

Shy Guy

Sarcastro

Ectomancer
Yosarian2
Nocmen
Max
andersonw
Oman
Thesp
VanDamien

Opie

Shy Guy

Skruffs

[col]

Shy Guy

Max
VanDamien
Oman
Thesp
Ectomancer
Nocmen
Sarcastro
andersonw
Skruffs
Yosarian2

Opie

[col]

Skruffs

Ectomancer

Shy Guy

VanDamien
Nocmen
Oman
andersonw
Sarcastro
Max
Thesp
Yosarian2

Opie

[col]

Thesp

Shy Guy

Max
Nocmen
Yosarian2
andersonw
Ectomancer
Sarcastro

Opie

Skruffs
Oman
VanDamien

[col]

VanDamian

Ectomancer
Yosarian2

Shy Guy

Max
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Oman

Opie

andersonw
Thesp
Skruffs

[col]

Yosarian2

VanDamien
Thesp
Skruffs
andersonw

Opie

Oman
Nocmen
Sarcastro
Max
Ectomancer

Shy Guy

AIght, here is the order they'd be lynched by Shy GUys' post vs the 'new' post with the altered Thesp/Skruffs lists:
[col]

Old Order:

Ectomancer
Nocmen
Max
VanDamian
Oman
Thesp
Sarcastro
Skruffs
andersonw
Yosarian2
FINAL TWO:
Opie
Shy Guy

[col]

New Order:

Max
Ectomancer
Nocmen
VanDamien
Oman
Thesp
Sarcastro
Skruffs
andersonw
Yosarian2
FINAL TWO:

Opie

Shy Guy

Now with some personal analysis:

Shy Guy, it doesn't matter if I put you at final two with me: Anderson will still hammer me day 8, and the other players who are already voting me (Yosarian, Opie) will msot likely NOT agree to put me at the bottom of the list if it means that they are 'bumped off' earlier; Yosarian especially is already defending the idea that there is no reason to get yourself lynched earlier than you need to be.

I'll do a nother run down and see *where* exactly it would benefit me to move my votes, and will consider changing my ballot, but if everyone does that, we will degenerate into a free for all which will be too consuming to overcome. Don't think there's much point in it.

I will point out that Anderson winds up 'changing his votes' more often than ANYONE else in the game; I doubt he's 'cleaver eough' (no offense intended) to intentionally set up his list to put 'dummy accounts' up top (like opie) with intentions of helping to vote out 'townie' players towards the end, but there's something about how he's in the middle of everyone's list but still makes it to final four that bugs me.

[Sarcastro]

Ugh, this is starting to get complicated.

To be honest, I don't mind Ecto's suggestion. Perhaps it's just because there are exactly four players I feel I have pro-town reads on, so moving the next-to-bottom two to the bottom two doesn't bug me much.

Thesp's analysis of Shy Guy worries me a bit, though. I really felt that Shy Guy was town before, but his weird attempt at a bargain with Skruffs just seems, well, weird. He did provide some justification for it, but I'm wondering if I wouldn't prefer Opie and Skruffs or VD and Skruffs (or Opie and VD, for that matter). Any of those three combinations for the final three is fine with me (as is any combination of one of them with me, but I don't think that's going to happen). If that's not possible, Shy Guy could be substituted for one of them.

I'm not going to change my vote yet, because I don't want to screw up people who are in the middle of some kind of analysis, but I think I'm going to move Shy Guy up a couple spots pretty soon. Of course, Opie and Shy Guy in the final two is still good, so I don't want to move Shy Guy up if it would cause anyone but Skruffs or VD to move into the final two.

I'm still worried about Yos. I don't like how he's getting so far when nobody seems to be willing to go out on a limb and say they actually have a pro-town read on him. It feels like people are just putting him near the bottom by default, and under no circumstances should he be in the final two. I'd also like to point out to both Shy Guy and Skruffs that if you guys had Yos closer to the top, it would probably help Skruffs make it futher.

[Ectomancer]

You all could just move me to the bottom and your job would be half done.

[Skruffs]

Right:
So I can't get to final two, I looked at the options, there are none. That's because of the 7 people who have me in one of their final 3 slots, five of them are eliminated by roudn 8.

Not only that, but Shy Guy, who wants me to help him get to final two, has almost every single one of those players at the TOP of his list: Max (2nd most town) VanDamien(Most town), Oman (5th most), Thesp (3rd), etc. The only person he doesn't have up top is Sarcastro; and with Sarc's last post towards Shy Guy I have a feeling he'll probably be getting up high on the list anyways.

So yeah, Shy Guy, I knwe there was something fishy about that. You and Yosarian have 6 people each putting you as top 2; Opie has only 3, along with me. Anderson, who comes in 4th, has 1. You don't need my support; and if you DO want it, you have to look at what is happeneing BEFORE final two; the people who think I'm most town are systematically eliminated. This is really pullign on my paranoia strings.

[Yosarian2]

Do you honestly believe that scum is holding out until the 11th hour? When the 11th hour is when we are [/i]most[/i] interested in altered ballots? I dont buy that arguement. Balloting has settled down, and we are experience very minor adjustments.

Personally, I think that one of the scum just did change his ballot; I'm increasingly thinking Thesp is probably scum. His last minute ballot change makes me even more convinced ShyGuy is town.