Replacing out
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Infinity 324 they (pl.)Survivorthey (pl.)
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I think this is mostly a site culture thing, I think it certainly can change but it's gonna take a while.
The way that helps me appreciate scum the most is through example. The more I see awesome scum performances from others, the more I want to play scum.-
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TemporalLich Grand Scheme
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Since you can't, you should assume good faith. It's not clear in that case.In post 48, DrippingGoofball wrote:
How do you prove that someone got a red PM, stewed for a few days with lame posting, then noped out of playing scum?In post 46, TemporalLich wrote:Clearly bad faith replacements should be reported to the list mods
You can't.
That's why we need to brand playing scum as noble and selfless.
What we should do is brand playing scum as being on a highly cohesive team - that's what scum is and the difference between scum and town is that you know who your friends are as scum. Going as far as to brand it as noble and selfless would give the wrong implications to those who want to play town, and make playing scum sound like a chore instead of fun.
pedit: You'd need to convince the NRG that that is Normal, and either way I'd probably just use a boilerplate if I had to. I prefer having the first post of the scum PT to have a short description of how the PT works and a list of all the players who have access to it.
ppedit: yeah - though for me having access to a PT with daytalk is what makes scum funtime will end-
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Datisi he/him, it/itsDrawn from Memoryhe/him, it/its
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personally i find it much more annoying when i'm scum and a townie replaces out than vice versa, but this is probably bias do to with knowing exactly what is happening when i know everyone's alignment. obviously i agree that both are *a problem* and greatly influence the outcome of games.
i would agree with ircher, though maybe i'm thinking harsher - 14 days of no joining new games? or 7 days at a minimum. that ruling already exists in the newbie queue (though i don't think i've seen it implemented in my 2 years here), and it says that it's "unacceptable to replace out due to boredom or any other similarly selfish reason". it should be applicable in all mafia games imo.
sidenote, the same (or harsher!) should be applied to the people who flake. seriously, it's sad how many times as a mod i've had people lose any interest in playing, and then not even have the decency to *tell me* they would like to replace out, which forces me to wait 2.5-3 days for the prod timers to tick out before i am legally able to replace them.
i know temporallich mentioned players who have legitimate reasons to replace out, but...
- if you suddenly have some sorta emergency in your life or you've suddenly gotten much busier, you're probably not gonna be joining a new mafia game within the week anyway.
- if it happens that you often have "emergencies" or "sudden life changes" that make you have "legitimate" rep-outs often... should you be playing mafia? this is a pretty time-consuming hobby. if you don't have time for it, it might not even be your fault, but sorry?
- if you're bored with the game or don't like your role - replacing out for this is already against the rules in the newbie queue, no reason it shouldn't be elsewhere.
- if the game is truly so toxic that it's unplayable... that's not a "i need to replace out" problem, that's a "what the fuck is the moderator doing" problem.
now, i'll admit the above list is not complete. and, the only two instances that i've (willingly) replaced out for was when the game was truly making me miserable (mixed in with some irl reasons), so i know that "good faith, i literally cannot stay in this game" replacements happen. *but* i also feel like in those instances, i'd have been fine eating a 7-day cooldown ban.
one problem with this that i can think of right now (there are probably more; i'm not well versed in this administrative discussion) is if two players encounter each other, and those two players are truly incompatible to play mafia with each other. those things happen, and blacklists exist for a reason. it seems a bit wrong to give a cooldown ban to the person who was the first to realize the game is just gonna be torture for both of them and stepped out first. so not sure i have a good solution for that one. implementing "official" blacklists and adding a "no cooldown-ban applies if a player reps out of a game that someone they have on their blacklist is" rule seems like both (1) more listmod work than it's realistically worth and (2) easily abuseable.
now, i agree that implementing something like this is (very?) likely to slow down the queues in some capacity. but is that really such a bad thing? what i mean is, should we be aiming for quality or quantity? personally i'd prefer waiting a bit longer for a game to fire if it meant that that game is ++likely to have fewer replacements and be played out "properly". and i reckon in time, such change would result in a site culture shift with people getting used to not replacing out as easily as they maybe do now.
and to touch on what dgb brought up - i can agree that on average, scum motivation currently is... ~ehh. that feels like a discussion that's related to the above issues, though not one and the same. if my proposal were to go live, unmotivated scum could potentially stay in the game and make a few posts here and there until they get yeeted. that would be blatant playing against wincon, but "proving" that someone is playing against wincon in such way feels both (1) pretty difficult and (2) like a slippery slope. so yeah, tackling "sitewide scum motivation" seems like a separate (but also important) issue that i don't actually have practical ideas for atm.
("scum coaches" and "mod pep talks" seem like things either outside the scope of normality (that i generally keep in, won't speak for theme games) and things that i don't think would be terribly... effective? and the rest of "fostering a culture of celebrating good scumplay" sounds good on paper, but again i don't have any ideas how to actually promote on site. other than personally hyping up my scumbuddies when i roll scum, and trying to have "quality" post-game discussions when town, but i've been doing these for a while now, so no "new" ideas i guess.)I will straight up disregard all reason if you have a PR dream again. You can come back and be like, “I dreamt that Locke is a N2 Bulletproof Multitasking Cop and Self-Targeting Doctor,” and I will go, “Okay, Locke kill it is then.”~M-
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Cabd QT Sniper
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Sadly can echo this.In post 43, DrippingGoofball wrote:In my experience, replacements are strongly AI.
If you want to hone your scum game, hit up the replacement thread and chances are you're going to end up with a scum slot.
I believe that the situation has gotten much worse over the history of the site. I would say that about 60-70% of my personal replacements were scum slots recently.
It's a pandemic and as newer players come in, they see that sandbagging as scum to get to the next town game is okay, it just snowballs down the hill...ShowHave retired for good; Life is too busy to have time or energy for mafia. It was fun~
And then, a Miracle, a Dance Game and a flight of fancy struck, one more game into the abyss
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Ircher He / Him / HisWhat A Grand IdeaHe / Him / His
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This isn't practical. The vast majority of these cases are going to go unpunished because while they might spew a slot scum (or town), there's a reasonable level of doubt as to the underlying motives. The number of bans issued for tactical replacement is very low; furthermore, even the best of faith replace outs can still be rather alignment indicative.In post 45, TemporalLich wrote:Report players to the listmods if they replace out to spew alignment.
I don't necessarily disagree, but in a lot of cases, this is influenced by their current position in the game. Players who are currently suspected have a much higher chance of replacing out as well as finding the game unbearable.In post 46, TemporalLich wrote:Players should be at liberty to replace out of games they legitimately can't bear to play or are unable to play
Not necessarily. Moderators cannot be present all the time, and reading the thread to spot toxicity is an even harder task (than the typical tasks). Mods could probably be more proactive in preventing toxicity, but I wouldn't necessarily blame it all on the moderator if the game does become toxic. That said, I think a lot of people have different definitions of toxic games, and for some people, that definition is much less than for others.In post 52, Datisi wrote:if the game is truly so toxic that it's unplayable... that's not a "i need to replace out" problem, that's a "what the fuck is the moderator doing" problem.-
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TemporalLich Grand Scheme
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Yeah, policy should still be to assume good faith. In clear cut cases you should report. In murky cases it's better to just accept the replacement without resistance.In post 54, Ircher wrote:This isn't practical. The vast majority of these cases are going to go unpunished because while they might spew a slot scum (or town), there's a reasonable level of doubt as to the underlying motives. The number of bans issued for tactical replacement is very low; furthermore, even the best of faith replace outs can still be rather alignment indicative.
Yeah being suspected (regardless of alignment, so this isn't AI, but might be argued as scummy but this is considered angleshooting) might influence replace outs, this is what a cooldown is intended to prevent. If a game is actually unbearable a cooldown is just a small hurdle. There should always be an option to replace out without fear of eating a long term ban or other punishment (or a modkill, which is an administrative action but more drastic than a force replacement) in case things go bad.In post 54, Ircher wrote:I don't necessarily disagree, but in a lot of cases, this is influenced by their current position in the game. Players who are currently suspected have a much higher chance of replacing out as well as finding the game unbearable.time will end-
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Datisi he/him, it/itsDrawn from Memoryhe/him, it/its
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oh i agree, i've had my own fair share of games that went to shit and i don't think i realistically could've done anything to fully prevent it. but the moderator should step in *at some point* to bring the game back on track. if the game has turned into a toxic shitfest and the moderator isn't doing anything about it, that's a problem. like, i guess my point is "if the game as a whole is so unbearable, give the mod a bit of time to step in and resolve the situation before impulsively replacing out".In post 54, Ircher wrote:
Not necessarily. Moderators cannot be present all the time, and reading the thread to spot toxicity is an even harder task (than the typical tasks). Mods could probably be more proactive in preventing toxicity, but I wouldn't necessarily blame it all on the moderator if the game does become toxic. That said, I think a lot of people have different definitions of toxic games, and for some people, that definition is much less than for others.In post 52, Datisi wrote:if the game is truly so toxic that it's unplayable... that's not a "i need to replace out" problem, that's a "what the fuck is the moderator doing" problem.
i feel like at least part of the solution to the issue of different definitions of toxicity would be to strictly define what is acceptable and what isn't.
and general sidenote, some sorta guide on how should a game moderator deal with toxicity would be useful. i feel like i've seen countless guides for running a game or designing a setup, but almost none for things like "dealing with toxicity in your games".I will straight up disregard all reason if you have a PR dream again. You can come back and be like, “I dreamt that Locke is a N2 Bulletproof Multitasking Cop and Self-Targeting Doctor,” and I will go, “Okay, Locke kill it is then.”~M-
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DrippingGoofball Mafia Piñata
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Right.In post 51, TemporalLich wrote:Since you can't, you should assume good faith.
But statistically, bad faith replacements are a plague.Paraphrasing a role PM takes seconds, fabricating a good fakeclaim takes an eternity.
"Metadiving DGB is like playing Roblox" - T3
"She's sort of like a quantum computer, her reads exist in multiple states at once. u have to take into account the other dimensions." - Morning Tweet-
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DrippingGoofball Mafia Piñata
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Interesting - how would you deal with alts?In post 28, Ythan wrote:I was actually considering the other direction, requiring multiple reps in to equal one rep out.Paraphrasing a role PM takes seconds, fabricating a good fakeclaim takes an eternity.
"Metadiving DGB is like playing Roblox" - T3
"She's sort of like a quantum computer, her reads exist in multiple states at once. u have to take into account the other dimensions." - Morning Tweet-
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Cabd QT Sniper
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I was brainstorming something similar many moons ago:
High scores good, negative scores bad. Could probably add a time delay dropoff to the penalty function if you cared to.
ShowHave retired for good; Life is too busy to have time or energy for mafia. It was fun~
And then, a Miracle, a Dance Game and a flight of fancy struck, one more game into the abyss
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DkKoba They/ThemSurvivorThey/Them
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cmon broIn post 5, Datisi wrote:ego
i feel like i've seen both "scum pockets townie to be their wrong vote in lylo, townie reps out, pocket gone" and "limbait townie close to yeet, reps out, replacement townspews, misyeet gone" situations happen because people lost interest in the game
there's most likely been "scum being scumread, reps out, great scum player reps in and saves slot" situations too,though i can't remember specific examples off the top of my head for that one
like i said in the other thread, replacements hurt the flow of the game, and there should be a system in that *strongly* encourages finishing games you signed up for, though again i don't know a way to properly implement that in practiceretired
"1 thing I will give you Dk, I think you are very good at manipulating. I don't mean that in a bad way, I just think you [have] this way with yourself. You know what to say and when to say [it]." ~VFP
"Koba doesn't really have a scumrange/townrange, Koba will kill your pet cat to win a game" ~Pooky-
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DkKoba They/ThemSurvivorThey/Them
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Funny because I have had the opposite experience in my completed games where I was a replacement.In post 53, Cabd wrote:
Sadly can echo this.In post 43, DrippingGoofball wrote:In my experience, replacements are strongly AI.
If you want to hone your scum game, hit up the replacement thread and chances are you're going to end up with a scum slot.
I believe that the situation has gotten much worse over the history of the site. I would say that about 60-70% of my personal replacements were scum slots recently.
It's a pandemic and as newer players come in, they see that sandbagging as scum to get to the next town game is okay, it just snowballs down the hill...retired
"1 thing I will give you Dk, I think you are very good at manipulating. I don't mean that in a bad way, I just think you [have] this way with yourself. You know what to say and when to say [it]." ~VFP
"Koba doesn't really have a scumrange/townrange, Koba will kill your pet cat to win a game" ~Pooky-
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chamber Cases are scummy
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Nancy Drew 39 She/HerNot that Inno ScentShe/Her
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From what I’ve observed players of either alignment can lose interest when they get run up but really no good way to policethat.
Public replacing out is against the rules like Saudade did in Nancy v Titus.
Spoiler:
I find flaking to be the most destabilizing to games in general - especially when the mod lets the game drag on for days without a prod or necessary replacement.**********We just need to tread carefully because if you slip up around her as scum she notices and will tear your spine out and slap you to death with it. (I'm slightly scared of Nancy)~the worst*******Nancy is pretty heavenly ngl~CheekyTeekyNancy-scum feels like a hot knife slicing through butter. Nancy-town feels like a magnifying glass in the sun glaring down at an insect.~Taly-
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Nancy Drew 39 She/HerNot that Inno ScentShe/Her
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My replacement rate albeit low is definitely not AI. That really depends, town replaces out a lot too.In post 14, OkaPoka wrote:what if i told you the act of replacing out is AI because its statistically correlated with being scum?**********We just need to tread carefully because if you slip up around her as scum she notices and will tear your spine out and slap you to death with it. (I'm slightly scared of Nancy)~the worst*******Nancy is pretty heavenly ngl~CheekyTeekyNancy-scum feels like a hot knife slicing through butter. Nancy-town feels like a magnifying glass in the sun glaring down at an insect.~Taly-
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Nancy Drew 39 She/HerNot that Inno ScentShe/Her
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I think if we punish anyone who isn’t a continual repeat offender or for a sudden rl emergency, people will just be afraid to sign up for anything and that would ultimately kill the site.
My personal experience is that other people’s replacements have either actually helped or at least not hurt me - irrespective of alignment.
I hear this argument mostly from disgruntled scum but I think a competent scum player should always have a backup plan.
When I was scum in Coalition, the town replacement obviously did hurt us but we played around it and still won and I’m not at all salty about that because I like to constantly challenge myself whatever alignment I roll and you just need to be flexible.
I even won when my scumbuddy replaced out. So it really hasn’t really ever caused me to lose as scum but otoh, has helped as town.
What I see as destabilizing to games is either blatantly obvious tactical replace out or flaking. Flaking has actually seriously harmed my games as either alignment and if MU has harsh punishments for that, I can’t understand why MS doesn’t.**********We just need to tread carefully because if you slip up around her as scum she notices and will tear your spine out and slap you to death with it. (I'm slightly scared of Nancy)~the worst*******Nancy is pretty heavenly ngl~CheekyTeekyNancy-scum feels like a hot knife slicing through butter. Nancy-town feels like a magnifying glass in the sun glaring down at an insect.~Taly-
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Ythan SheWelcome to the HaystackShe
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Don't the mods know who most alts are alts of? Idk actually but I think more or less. If that's what you mean.In post 58, DrippingGoofball wrote:
Interesting - how would you deal with alts?In post 28, Ythan wrote:I was actually considering the other direction, requiring multiple reps in to equal one rep out.-
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OkaPoka Survivor
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anecdotally i find it so cheaty, but i still can't help myself when it happens in the scenario where person in question gets run up, reps out, and then me/collective town gives the replacement time to 'townspew' themselves.In post 63, Nancy Drew 39 wrote:From what I’ve observed players of either alignment can lose interest when they get run up but really no good way to policethat.
Public replacing out is against the rules like Saudade did in Nancy v Titus.
Spoiler:
I find flaking to be the most destabilizing to games in general - especially when the mod lets the game drag on for days without a prod or necessary replacement.
i do wonder whats the correct thing to do? lim players who replace out to preserve integrity of the game or play to win by getting all info possible? i think most people do the latter choice and its happened enough where ive thought about whether im crossing any lines-
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Isis she/her, not theyBest in Classshe/her, not they
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This is not an accurate reflection of site expectations for moderators. If you moderate a game on mafiascum.net, you are expected to read the game, including the unbolded text, as closely as though you were spectating/playing in it. We have issued warnings to moderators who do not do so.In post 54, Ircher wrote:.
Not necessarily. Moderators cannot be present all the time, and reading the thread to spot toxicity is an even harder task (than the typical tasks). Mods could probably be more proactive in preventing toxicity, but I wouldn't necessarily blame it all on the moderator if the game does become toxic. That said, I think a lot of people have different definitions of toxic games, and for some people, that definition is much less than for others.In post 52, Datisi wrote:if the game is truly so toxic that it's unplayable... that's not a "i need to replace out" problem, that's a "what the fuck is the moderator doing" problem.
If you are reading a game, it is natural to come across most or all of its toxicity.
Now, if a game moderator sees one player call another player a "vorpal butterknife swordfish", and feels that is harsh but part of the heat of mafia and issues no warning, and mafiascum staff review the same post and has a consensus opinion that it's out of line for sitewide standards, we won't be upset that a game moderator in good faith balanced the principles of player comfort and noninterventionism differently than we would have. But if the game moderator didn't issue a warning because they are not following their own game and no determination was made at all, that's below our standards for the site.
There are other infractions that are more clearcut and that game moderators need to act on without need for discretion, such as if a player is using the game to discuss another ongoing game in a way not allowed by that other ongoing game."Let us say that you are right and there are two worlds. How much, then, is this 'other world' worth to you? What do you have there that you do not have here? Money? Power? Something worth causing the prince so much pain for?'"
"Well, I..."
"What? Nothing? You would make the prince suffer over... nothing?"-
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Dunnstral he/himGoodfellashe/him
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How do you make the distinction?In post 68, Isis wrote:Now, if a game moderator sees one player call another player a "vorpal butterknife swordfish", and feels that is harsh but part of the heat of mafia and issues no warning, and mafiascum staff review the same post and has a consensus opinion that it's out of line for sitewide standards, we won't be upset that a game moderator in good faith balanced the principles of player comfort and noninterventionism differently than we would have. But if the game moderator didn't issue a warning because they are not following their own game and no determination was made at all, that's below our standards for the site.-
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OkaPoka
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TemporalLich Grand Scheme
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Karma systems could be based ongames played until completionandreplace outs- that way a player who doesn't like replacing into games can gain good karma by not replacing out.
Games played until completionis how many games you have played until the game finishes, whether you replaced in or /inned. Dying (unless it is modkill) will count as completing a game when the game finishes.
Replace outsis how many games you have replaced out of or been force replaced out. Modkill counts as a replace out for karma purposes.
A Karma system like this can still encourage Jester-like play when suspected and not wanting to play the game however. Poor karma can lead to scrutiny of replace outs and longer cooldown periods when replacing out.
For a more complex karma system, replace ins can give a bonus, and flaking replace outs and modkills give a penalty.time will end-
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Dunnstral he/himGoodfellashe/him
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Nero Cain Survivor
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I think when you sign up to play a game you are making a commitment. Obviously, life happens (and life job/school are more important) but I feel you should try your best to honor your commitment.Of all tyrannies,a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
edited c.s. lewis quote b/c limit-
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Nancy Drew 39 She/HerNot that Inno ScentShe/Her
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Why do we keep seeing these kinds of threads, yet not a one on flaking, which imo drags more games down than anything.**********We just need to tread carefully because if you slip up around her as scum she notices and will tear your spine out and slap you to death with it. (I'm slightly scared of Nancy)~the worst*******Nancy is pretty heavenly ngl~CheekyTeekyNancy-scum feels like a hot knife slicing through butter. Nancy-town feels like a magnifying glass in the sun glaring down at an insect.~Taly
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