Werewolf a game Part 2 (this time with MAFIA!)

[Rysto]

Oh, yeah, we need to leave ourselves lots of time in between our "final" votes and the end of the Day. The last two Days it's been late-running bandwagons that have led to lynchings, and a lot of players seem to have been caught by surprise by them. I think we should get our votes in 24 hours early.

[Kat]

They have not doggedly returned to the same conflict over and over. They have been opportunistic, using their votes as tools. Now that I’ve said this, they may change their approach, but I’d humbly suggest reviewing people’s voting records not just for apparently faulty logic – which can be employed maliciously by scum or in genuine error by townspeople – or for a bad record of identifying Mafia (which is a characteristic shared by, frankly, everyone in the game) – but also for that sort of casual, opportunistic approach to voting.

I guess I'm playing backwards then, because I've been more suspicious of the folks who were doggedly returning to the same conflict over and over. Does this mean I have to read the thread again? *shudders in terror*

So that’s my SK theory. Thoughts?

Actually that makes some sense. His post with the vote switch to Lakai put him on my radar, too, although before I didn't really have that high a suspicion of him. Does brewha have a response?

I am still confident that Pygmy Rugger is scum, and have become extremely suspicious of hocow in the last day or two, as well. I have reasons, which I will outline a bit later tonight, but if I don’t get to the dishes right now I will be lynched quite for real.

I was inclined to give Pygmy Rugger the benefit of the doubt, based on my suspicions of cowgirl who never responded to my requests to clarify by linking or quoting what she called his "smoke and mirror" posts. If she is the Guardian Angel, then he loses some of that. On the other hand, hocow's not on my radar at all. Some days, I forget she's still playing.

[ArizonaTeach]

Oh Thank God. I was about to role-claim SK because this game was making me tear my hair out and I just wanted it to be over. I wish I could say that I was killed because I was getting too close to the Truth, but frankly I'm surprised I was targetted at all since I've successfully led the charge against more than one townie and was pretty good at doing the mafia's work for them. Ah well.

Well played, bad guys. Well played indeed.

[brewha]

OK, I can see how this makes me look bad. But I, like everyone else, am getting frustrated. I know this is a team game, and I know I will still win if the town pulls this one off. But, like I said before, I know that I'm a townie. I didn't know that malacandra wasn't. I had been suspicious of him because of the dispute he and Queuing had earlier in the day.


I don't know why you guys can't see what I'm seeing. We're getting manipulated by a very skilled set of mafia. I tell you what. Lynch Queuing or Lakai. If either one of them turns up town, I walk to the gallows, put the noose round my neck and happily leap off the platform. Because if they're town, I got no clue what to do next.

Or, if you'd rather, lynch me first. When I turn up town, take both of them out. But, we're down to 15. If you kill me, we likely lose two more town tonight. If we don't take out the SK the following day, we all lose.

[Queuing]

Ah, another offer to die. That has been tried already you know.

Anyway, since at the moment I am still choosing to believe all role claims, including aguecheek, and he says Monkey Mensch came up town, I will

unvote monkey mensch

I will be reading the posting histories again, and will put a vote in tomorrow.

Rysto aguecheek was suppose to do you, but he did me instead. So it seems you may not get done. Or I may do it, but I was in a car accident recently (I am fine) and need to take care of a lot of BS such as buying a new car and arguing with an insurance adjuster about how much money he will be giving me.

cowgirl did you do kat?

[Fretful Porpentine]

Well, on the bright side, at this point we've got almost a fifty-fifty chance of hitting scum if we pick a lynch victim completely at random. Of course, so far we've been doing much worse than we would by random chance, so it's probably best not to count too much on that...

I think it's time to take a long, hard second look at cowgirl and, especially, Aguecheek. If they are telling the truth, they've both been remarkably ineffective at using their powers, and it doesn't make much sense to me that the Mafia would go after Menoccio or ArizonaTeach when there are tempting townies in power roles ripe for the killing. (And yeah, I know one can argue that maybe they're holding off in hopes that the town will do their work for them, but since the town's strategy so far is to hold off from lynching anyone who has made a role claim, that doesn't seem a very likely bet. On the other hand, it makes fake role-claiming a great strategy for scum, particularly if the claim can't be tested.)

Menoccio was one of the more vocal skeptics of Aguecheek's role-claim, and if that claim was a lie, it's not hard to see why someone might have wanted him silenced.

[Lakai]

I thought it over and I like Rysto's idea that mafia is going after the SK better than my idea that they are scared of the GA. Though that would mean that the SK killed Menocchio. Why would the SK do that?

I'm digging Storyteller's analysis. Vote brewha.

[Aguecheek]

Right now, I'm on brewha's side. His reasons might be different then mine, but like I said earlier, I'm gonna vote Queuing.

I'm on record regarding getting rid of the SK early in the game, and I'm still for getting rid of the SK.

[brewha]

One other thing before dishes, though...

Folks, I say we take out Queuing today. He appears to be taking the role as the town leader since Blaster Master's demise. And he has been wrong. Either maliciously or mistakenly, he has been wrong. We've done nothing but lynch town folk and we've done so following his lead.

Regardless of his affiliation, the town would be better off without him.

Vote Queuing



(bolding mine)

Does this sentence make any sense to anyone unless my theory is right and brewha is the SK? At this stage of the game, lynching a townie just because he's made incorrect guesses would not be good for the town at all. We're getting down to the nitty gritty here - we can't afford to keep killing townspeople "regardless of [their] affiliation. It sounds, again, like all brewha cares about is keeping himself alive and getting rid of anyone who points suspicion, no matter how lightly, toward brewha.




No, you misunderstood. I'm voting Queuing becuase I think he is scum. Very smart and manipulative, but scum. There are obviously people who don't agree with me on that point. I was trying to convince them to vote Queuing as well. I figured that even if people were on the fence about Queuings scumminess, they could rationalize the vote by realizing that we have been making bad decisions while listening to him.



Ah, another offer to die. That has been tried already you know.


Are you saying that offering yourself to the noose is some kind of smoke screen to throw town off your scummy scent? Yes, that has been done before.

My first plan involves killing who I think is scum(you and Lakai). If you are not, I will be glad to die, I won't have a clue where to go from there anyway.

[Menocchio]

Drat. And I was certain I'd identified one, maybe two mobs.

[storyteller0910]

All right, so who’s left? I’ve already outlined my feelings aboutbrewha, which his responses have not changed. sturmhauke and Pleonast are off the table, and I’m not going to vote for myself. As noted yesterday, I believe that Lakai is probably town, based on pima’s reading and my own analysis of his voting history. Everyone else I’m returning to the pile for further study. Here’s the list, with my comments - my top two suspects helpfully saved for last, everyone else presented in alphabetical order:

Aguecheek / cowgirl: Convenient that these two are first, because I have the same problem with both of them: I doubt their stories, but worry about significantly hurting the town effort if my doubt is misguided.

Let me start with cowgirl, because I think her status informs Aguecheek’s. I have doubts that she is the Guardian Angel, based on two things. The first is that I had assumed right up to the moment of her role claim that there was no GA in the game at all. In his original rule post, NAF presented a list of “Possible roles NOT all of which are being used.” There is no wiggle room in that statement, no “may” not be used, no maybe; at least one of the roles described by NAF is not in the game. We have confirmation so far of every pro-town role except the Miller and the GA. It is possible that NAF gave us a list and exempted only one role, but I considered that unlikely. Still possible, though. However, if there is a Miller out there, then cowgirl’s claim is definitely false, based on my reading of the rules.

Further, if she is the GA, there is no earthly reason why pima should not have been protected on the night she died. Everyone knew pima would be the target that night; a few people even said it explicitly in the thread. cowgirl’s claim that she hadn’t had time to catch up by then is odd - if she has a night role, she could theoretically have requested the entire 48 real life hours to catch up and make a protection decision.

So, doubt. But... Last night Menocchio was killed. I am assuming that he was killed by Mafia, targeting a semi-confirmed townie. Why Menocchio and not a putative power role in Ague or one of our Masons? Well, several possible reasons: (1) cowgirl isn’t Mafia, and the Mafia was afraid that she might block one (or more) of those three targets, so they went for a target unlikely to be protected; (2) cowgirl IS Mafia, but they wanted us to think they were thinking that way. We must also consider the possibility that Aguecheek is Mafia, and so wouldn’t have been targeted either way.

I see four possibilities:

1. Both cowgirl and Ague are what they claim to be.
2. Ague is Mafia and cowgirl is not, in which case cowgirl unwittingly gives the Mob a cover reason to not kill Ague.
3. cowgirl is Mafia and Ague is not. I don’t believe this is actually the case; if it was, Aguecheek would be dead right now.
4. They’re both scum, in which case they’ve created a really nice bluff that we can expose only by lynching one of them.

‘Tis a puzzlement, and I don’t know the best way to go with this problem.

More forthcoming shortly; I figure I’ll try to break my contribution up into separate posts to avoid taxing the Board.

[Lakai]

So, doubt. But... Last night Menocchio was killed. I am assuming that he was killed by Mafia, targeting a semi-confirmed townie. Why Menocchio and not a putative power role in Ague or one of our Masons? Well, several possible reasons: (1) cowgirl isn’t Mafia, and the Mafia was afraid that she might block one (or more) of those three targets, so they went for a target unlikely to be protected; (2) cowgirl IS Mafia, but they wanted us to think they were thinking that way. We must also consider the possibility that Aguecheek is Mafia, and so wouldn’t have been targeted either way.

The mafia could also be going after the SK. I would not give too much credit to your choice #2, because it is very beneficial for the mafia to kill confirmed towns. It gives the town a bigger pool of unknowns to choose from and less chance of getting mafia.

[Pleonast]

The Mafia are winning. They need to kill the Serial Killer more than they need to kill Townies. The Masons are obviously not the SK (unless NAF is really screwing with our minds ;) ). Masons will be safe until the SK is found.

Once the SK is killed, the Guardian Angel should protect one (but probably not both) of the Masons.

[brewha]

Storyteller, I see that you are still convinced of my scumminess. I may have chosen the wrong words to articulate my suspicions, but that does not mean that my suspicions are wrong or that I am mafia.

Re-read the situation that lead to MadTheSwine's lynching. If I were mafia, I would have just sat back and let the lynching happen. I had my vote on someone else, so if I were mafia, and therefore knew that MTS was going to turn up town, I wouldn't have looked suspicious because I wasn't voting for him.

I didn't know that MTS wasn't town, but I had greater suspicions of others and no reason to beleive that he wasn't town.

In the same situation, lets say that I was the SK. That makes even less sense. IMO, the last thing the SK would want to do is to draw attention. Why would the SK care who got lynched? Once again, the SK's best response would be to leave their vote on someone who wasn't going to get lynched so that after the lynching, they could sit back and say that it wasn't their fault because they didn't vote for the lynchee.

Whether it be Mob or SK, they certainly wouldn't stand up in front of the crowd and ask everyone to reconsider their vote.


I will admit that I'm really bad at this game. I spent the first few days sitting back and listening more than participating. When I found that that didn't work, I started to get vocal about who I thought was or wasn't scum. All that seems to do is put the spotlight on me. It hasn't been casting me in a very good light either. But, I'm not going to just sit back and let the town get manipulated by the Mob. If that leads to my death, so be it - I'd rather go down fighting.

[brewha]

Oh, and not to put too much pressure on, here's a scary thought.

If we don't manage to lynch scum today or tomorrow, and the SK takes out town tonight and tomorrow night, the SK wins and we all lose.

We got the rest of today and tomorrow to get this figured out, or our fair Cecilton goes to the dogs.

[brewha]

Oh, that's assuming that there is 4 or 5 mafia left. If there's more than that, we lose tomorrow, if there's less we get another day.

[storyteller0910]

Storyteller, I see that you are still convinced of my scumminess. I may have chosen the wrong words to articulate my suspicions, but that does not mean that my suspicions are wrong or that I am mafia.

Re-read the situation that lead to MadTheSwine's lynching. If I were mafia, I would have just sat back and let the lynching happen. I had my vote on someone else, so if I were mafia, and therefore knew that MTS was going to turn up town, I wouldn't have looked suspicious because I wasn't voting for him.

I didn't know that MTS wasn't town, but I had greater suspicions of others and no reason to beleive that he wasn't town.

In the same situation, lets say that I was the SK. That makes even less sense. IMO, the last thing the SK would want to do is to draw attention. Why would the SK care who got lynched? Once again, the SK's best response would be to leave their vote on someone who wasn't going to get lynched so that after the lynching, they could sit back and say that it wasn't their fault because they didn't vote for the lynchee.

Whether it be Mob or SK, they certainly wouldn't stand up in front of the crowd and ask everyone to reconsider their vote.


I will admit that I'm really bad at this game. I spent the first few days sitting back and listening more than participating. When I found that that didn't work, I started to get vocal about who I thought was or wasn't scum. All that seems to do is put the spotlight on me. It hasn't been casting me in a very good light either. But, I'm not going to just sit back and let the town get manipulated by the Mob. If that leads to my death, so be it - I'd rather go down fighting.

You know, at this point, you get points from me just for posting to the thread at all; it seems like the game has petered out quite a bit. We're 24 hours into the Day and nothing is really happening.

And I'm hating my own analysis at this point. I just spent an hour trying to formulate a post that would lay out my reasons for suspecting Pygmy Rugger and hocow in devestating fashion, and found that apart from Pygmy's seeming tendency to vote where it's most convenient, and hocow's leaping into the Malacandra / Queuing dustup a few days ago in what seemed like an opportunistic fashion, I don't really have anything like the evidence I thought I had.

We need new evidence, which is only going to come from further discussion. If people don't start talking soon, we're going to be in a lot of trouble.

[Rysto]

Oh, and not to put too much pressure on, here's a scary thought.

If we don't manage to lynch scum today or tomorrow, and the SK takes out town tonight and tomorrow night, the SK wins and we all lose.

We got the rest of today and tomorrow to get this figured out, or our fair Cecilton goes to the dogs.
The Mafia can out themselves to the town one-by-one to buy time. The sooner they do this, the more time they buy. I'd encourage the Mafia to buy as much time as possible. :D

[Queuing]

In the same situation, lets say that I was the SK. That makes even less sense. IMO, the last thing the SK would want to do is to draw attention. Why would the SK care who got lynched? Once again, the SK's best response would be to leave their vote on someone who wasn't going to get lynched so that after the lynching, they could sit back and say that it wasn't their fault because they didn't vote for the lynchee.

Whether it be Mob or SK, they certainly wouldn't stand up in front of the crowd and ask everyone to reconsider their vote.

Huh? Isn't this what I am doing? What you accuse me of doing at least? Standing up in front of the crowd? And isn't this the reason you think I am scum, maybe the SK?

I am sorry, but very few of your arguments make sense. You accuse me of one thing, use it to try to drum up support to lynch me, yet when someone accuses you, you use it as a defense?

Huh?

Lynch Brewha

[brewha]

Huh? Isn't this what I am doing? What you accuse me of doing at least? Standing up in front of the crowd? And isn't this the reason you think I am scum, maybe the SK?



This isn't the reason, this is a reason.

All the rest of our vocal players have been taken out. You are still alive because either

A) you're mafia

or

B) You are wrong on your accusations and the mob doesn't see you as a threat.


I'm betting that it is A.


Back when you and Malacandra got into it, I figured that one of you two were mafia. We now know it wasn't him.

[Rysto]

All the rest of our vocal players have been taken out. So who are these vocal players who have been taken out for being vocal?

[brewha]

So who are these vocal players who have been taken out for being vocal?


So far it has been Blaster Master and Jsexton. Both were killed by Mafia after they were forced to role claim by Queuing.




I see a disturbing trend going on. It seems that everyone who has had a dispute with Queuing has ended up dead one way or another. So far, Zuma, Malacandra, Blaster Master, Jsexton, and Guadrene have all either FOS'd Queuing or have been fingered by him. They are all dead.

This post I find quite
condemning (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8423773&postcount=1203). Queuing want to us to lynch either a mason or a townie. And if (surprise surprise) they don't turn up as scum, he wants us to take out our doc.

Here (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8422860&postcount=1118) he truly believes that our Vigilante and two of our masons are scum. The rest of his list is either still alive or confirmed town.

Once (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8424389&postcount=1282) again he calls for the deaths for our Vigilante and two of our masons.

I reall don't get this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8425538&postcount=1455) one.


Well on preview, it seems that the clock is desired to start for Gadarene. Heck, I still think he is town, but like he said about me, all I know is I am town. If Gadarene is town whom do we direct MB to kill? We 100% trust Zuma and Pleonast now. IMO if Gadarene is town, we kill Zuma. If he is scum, then I guess the old plan would have to been to kill me, so lets do that.

Queuing is saying that if Gadarene is town (which he is) we should kill Zuma who he 100% beleives is trustworthy?!? WTF?

I only made it through about half of his posts and this is what I came up with. I'll dig deeper, but I want to encourage all of the actual townies to go through this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8496977&postcount=3133) post summary and see for yourselves.

If Queuing isn't mafia, he is one bad judge of character.

[Rysto]

So far it has been Blaster Master and Jsexton. Both were killed by Mafia after they were forced to role claim by Queuing.
So, the Vigilante and the Doctor? And you think that they were night-killed for talking a lot? :dubious:

[brewha]

How did we know that they were the VIG and the Doc? They were forced to role claim, because they went up against Queuing. I'm not making this up. Go and read his post summary.

I'm compiling some more of his damning posts, but feel free to read them yourself.

[storyteller0910]

So, the Vigilante and the Doctor? And you think that they were night-killed for talking a lot? :dubious:

Heh.

Part of my concern with Queuing right now is that - although I personally believe him to be town - nearly every Day seems to be dominated by discussion of Queuing and whatever player is in conflict with him. This makes it even easier to hide from scrutiny; it seems you can say whatever you want; as long as you don't get engaged in the Queuing dustup of the Day, no one will really even notice you. I think that's a function of Queuing's prolific posting, but it's becoming a huge problem. There are a considerable number of players who have managed to get this far without leaving much of an impression at all.

I am beginning to believe that the town, as a whole, has to either decide provisionally to trust Queuing for now, or lynch him. But we need to stop talking about him and start talking about other candidates, one way or another, because we're becoming a bit myopic and it's hurting us.

[Rysto]

Ok, so Queuing has had the bad luck of having a part in us forcing the Vig and Doc to out themselves. Given that he couldn't possibly have known their roles whether he is scum or not, what, exactly, does this prove?

[brewha]

Just so everyone is prepared, I'm expecting a 10,000 word thesis from Queuing that doesn't really explain why he's innocent. It will just be long enough so that everyone will choose to presume his innocence rather than read it all.

[brewha]

Ok, so Queuing has had the bad luck of having a part in us forcing the Vig and Doc to out themselves. Given that he couldn't possibly have known their roles whether he is scum or not, what, exactly, does this prove?


It proves, like I said before, that Queuing is bad for the town. Whether or not he knew their roles, if he were mafia, he knew that they were town. And, judging by his performance so far, he is damn good at what he does and probably had a pretty good guess that they had power roles before forcing them to claim.

[brewha]

Heh.

Part of my concern with Queuing right now is that - although I personally believe him to be town - nearly every Day seems to be dominated by discussion of Queuing and whatever player is in conflict with him. This makes it even easier to hide from scrutiny; it seems you can say whatever you want; as long as you don't get engaged in the Queuing dustup of the Day, no one will really even notice you. I think that's a function of Queuing's prolific posting, but it's becoming a huge problem. There are a considerable number of players who have managed to get this far without leaving much of an impression at all.

I am beginning to believe that the town, as a whole, has to either decide provisionally to trust Queuing for now, or lynch him. But we need to stop talking about him and start talking about other candidates, one way or another, because we're becoming a bit myopic and it's hurting us.

That is exactly what I'm saying. I was one of those that just sat in the background and watched town get lynched. Now I've called him out again and almost got lynched yesterday. And, if he has his way, I will get it today.

It is hurting us and it is becoming a trend. It seems that every day, someone casts suspicion on Queuing and everyday someone other than Queuing gets lynched. Either we ignore him or we lynch him. I don't care which, we just need to stop listening to him.

[Rysto]

IIRC, We've successfully lynched scum once, and that was because a Cop successfully investigatedFCoD. I don't think that there's a living townie who we can say has been "good for the town" by that measure.

[Queuing]

So far it has been Blaster Master and Jsexton. Both were killed by Mafia after they were forced to role claim by Queuing.

Huh? So I was the only one who thought BM was scum? So my vote now counts for 10?

JSexton? Again I was the only one who thought he was scum?

You sir are giving me far to much credit. I may have lead the BM bandwagon, but I sure as hell didn't led the JSexton one.

I see a disturbing trend going on. It seems that everyone who has had a dispute with Queuing has ended up dead one way or another. So far, Zuma, Malacandra, Blaster Master, Jsexton, and Guadrene have all either FOS'd Queuing or have been fingered by him. They are all dead.

So they are. Not sure what that proves. Can't deny they are dead. However I FOS'd Gadarene day 1, and then worked with him on day 2, so not real sure why he is on your list/

This post I find quite
condemning (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8423773&postcount=1203). Queuing want to us to lynch either a mason or a townie. And if (surprise surprise) they don't turn up as scum, he wants us to take out our doc.

Hmm, context anyone? This post was done before claiming. Nor did we know JSexton was the Doc. I really don't mind answering all of your questions, but how about a little context and stop with the exaggerations and outright lies, ok?

Here (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8422860&postcount=1118) he truly believes that our Vigilante and two of our masons are scum. The rest of his list is either still alive or confirmed town.

That lousy context problem again. Maybe you should go back and read the thread, or at least day 2 and find out when I said those things. not just that I said them. Plus I didn't realize that we knew storyteller or hocow was town.

How do you know that?



Once (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8424389&postcount=1282) again he calls for the deaths for our Vigilante and two of our masons.

Again, check your timeline. I did not know Zuma was a mason at the time.

Please, before you make an argument check your facts. You have taken all of these posts out of context, assuming knowledge that we have now that we didn't have then, and blaming me for it.

Didn't you get upset about cowgirl doing this very thing?

I reall don't get this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8425538&postcount=1455) one.

Hmm, what I get out of that is since we trust Zuma and Pleonast now, but don't trust me or gadarene, and it seems that gadarene is going down, if he is scum kill me. To each his own however.

If Queuing isn't mafia, he is one bad judge of character.

Finally something you said makes sense. I am a bad judge of character I suppose.

At least I keep my arguments consistent, don't jump around using one argument to defend myself and the same argument to lynch another. Nor is my vote for sale open to change at the mere worry of my own impending doom. Nor do I take posts completely out of context, call them facts and use them to lynch people.

ON preview; please do show my posts. Digest them, analyze them, just remember the context in which they were said. Also you seem to want to accuse me of things without me taking time to defend myself. Sorry, won't do that. If you lynch me, you lynch a townsperson and inch closer to losing.

Storyteller, I agree. I agree completely. I have tried to be more quiet, but everyday there is a new attempt to lynch me. First from aguecheek, then from brewha. It is continuous, and this one led by brewha doesn't even make sense. He is just throwing accusations out at me with no real basis except for the fact that I talk a lot, taking posts out of context and using them as evidence.

Should I not bother to defend myself? I really don't want to keep answering him, but I feel as though I must.

Brewha, my way? Again you are crediting me with starting things I haven't even started. Did I vote for you first? No. Are you even reading this thread or are so blind that all you see is something with a Q and you go batshit?

[Queuing]

That is exactly what I'm saying. I was one of those that just sat in the background and watched town get lynched. Now I've called him out again and almost got lynched yesterday. And, if he has his way, I will get it today.

It is hurting us and it is becoming a trend. It seems that every day, someone casts suspicion on Queuing and everyday someone other than Queuing gets lynched. Either we ignore him or we lynch him. I don't care which, we just need to stop listening to him.

This is not what you are saying. What you are saying is I am scum. And trying to prove it. Saying people have listened to me when no one really has. First exhibit; Monkey Mensch is still alive. If you don't care which stop trying to get me killed, forcing me to talk again. Just shut the hell up, let others talk, don't accuse people if you are going to use their defending themselves as further proof to leadership or scumminess or whatever the hell it is you think.

Have some damn consistency in your thinking.

[brewha]

That lousy context problem again. Maybe you should go back and read the thread, or at least day 2 and find out when I said those things. not just that I said them. Plus I didn't realize that we knew storyteller or hocow was town.

How do you know that?


....



Are you even reading this thread or are so blind that all you see is something with a Q and you go batshit?


Are you reading the thread? I said


Everyone else on his list is either STILL ALIVE or CONFIRMED TOWN.


That is to say that if they are still alive, they are not yet confirmed town.

Yes, our masons, vig, and doc were not confirmed when you wanted them killed. The only people that knew that they were all town would be mafia. You've been pretty consistent in killing off town, regardless of your defense of such actions.


You still haven't responded to my previous post. You just called me out on being hypocritical between my actions and my words, but what about my last post where you called me out for voting for Malacandra without being sure of his scumminess, when you did exactly the same thing when you voted for me yesterday. You, in fact, put me in the position to have to vote Malacandra to stay off the noose.

[brewha]

Queuing, you're coming off like a madman. I hope others see that as well.

[Pleonast]

Ok, time to get the ball spinning faster. I'll be voting for whoever hasn't voted, in order of scummiest to least (IMHO). If you don't like it, vote. For now, vote hocow.

Would someone like to put together some voting summaries of who's voted for who? I think that may be more worthwhile than combing through posts (but don't stop doing that, either).

[NAF1138]

The Vote count so far:

2- brewha - (Lakai, Queuing)
2- Queuing - (brewha, Aguecheek)
1- hocow - Pleonast)

[Queuing]

Queuing, you're coming off like a madman. I hope others see that as well.

I am coming off like a madman? Might went to step back, and read a bit there, bucko.

I voted for you to save our cop. I said that in the post, but again you don't read what I write. Regardless, I am done with you. You complain about me making to much noise, and then continue to attack me. I will no longer answer your posts.

[brewha]

Brewha, my way? Again you are crediting me with starting things I haven't even started. Did I vote for you first? No. Are you even reading this thread or are so blind that all you see is something with a Q and you go batshit?

I really didn't understand this whole line. Not that I expect an explanation anymore. It appears I ruffled some feathers and now you want to pout about it.

True, you didn't vote for me first. Lakai did. I have already publicly FOS'd him as scum as well. I came out today swinging at you and he responds by voting for my lynching. Coincidence?

[brewha]

[RP Off]

Queuing, we may be getting close to crossing the line with personal insults. I can take it as long as it's understood it's within the context of the game. I hope you're not taking personally. I really am just in the spirit of the game.

[RP On]

Scum!

[Santo Rugger]

Pleonast claimed <snip> 4.5 hours ago.

<snip>We 100% trust Zuma and Pleonast now. IMO if Gadarene is town, we kill Zuma. If he is scum, then I guess the old plan would have to been to kill me, so lets do that.<snip>


<snip>Hmm, what I get out of that is since we trust Zuma and Pleonast now, but don't trust me or gadarene, and it seems that gadarene is going down, if he is scum kill me. To each his own however.<snip>

Since you're not answering brewha's posts, I'll ask. Even though this is from Day 2, which I detest going back to, I find both the original statement and the rebuttal rather odd. Why is it that you wanted to kill zuma, regardless of anybody elses affiliation, if we knew he was a Mason at that time? Your defence just glosses over the fact that you were still targeting zuma. It completely ignores that fact, and you simply reply to brewha's accusation by saying that you offered your own neck if Gadarene turned up scum. Well, if you were scum, you'd have known Gadarene wasn't before the rest of us did.

Vote Queuing.

[StarvingButStrong]

I'm not ready to vote yet -- Pleonast, we're only 24 hours into the 'day', so why should everyone vote right away? Why not wait a bit in hopes of having some new info, instead of relying on what we already know? Especially seeing as how the old level of info just resulted in another town lynch. :(


One thing that I found suspicious about Queuing that I don't think has been mentioned yet: back around Day Three he started listing which players had posted the fewest times, and urging us to start voting for them. He did this repeatedly -- I counted at least four times while skimming, and there might have been more.

What's suspicious about that? Well, at the time he started doing it, guess who was firmly ensconced at the top of the list?

Maybe he was right, or maybe it was just a great way to turn attention away from himself.


OTOH, the more I think about it, the more bothered I am by Aguecheek's still being alive. I mean, a beat cop is an ACTIVE danger to the Mafia -- why haven't they made a priority out of getting rid of him?

[Queuing]

I really didn't understand this whole line. Not that I expect an explanation anymore. It appears I ruffled some feathers and now you want to pout about it.

True, you didn't vote for me first. Lakai did. I have already publicly FOS'd him as scum as well. I came out today swinging at you and he responds by voting for my lynching. Coincidence?

Sigh.

No feathers are ruffled. This is a game, have no fear. I didn't want to answer you anymore because you (and others) were accusing me of talking to much. So say I will shut-up. And now I am pouting? No matter what I do or say you turn it into a scum tell. That is why I said I won't answer you again. Its a waste of time and just adds to my post count while doing nothing productive. I swear this is the last time I will answer you :).

Holy fuck, no matter what I say you will twist it into me being scum. Ok, I get it, you think I am scum. I am not, but you are entitled to your opinion. What does Lakai voting for you have to do with me being scum?

Pygmy Rugger, I don't remember when I said that, I don't know the context of the post. I am not going to go through the day 2 mess again to find out. I am not scum. I have never changed the way I play the game, I have never changed what I say. I am town. Beyond that there is nothing else I can say.

FTR, I don't think brewha is scum anymore. I am starting to think the earlier idea, said by me, said by Rysto and I think said by others, I don't get why so many people can be so quiet. Is hocow even still alive? Hows about Fretful?

Therefore, to try to put some pressure on them I suppose I

unvote brewha
lynch fretful porpentine

[Queuing]

Hmm, writing a post, answering the phone and coming back to it can make you look like you are schizophrenic. FTR, the line beginning "holy fuck" was written before the above line. Lousy inability to edit (and being to dumb to preview I suppose)! Also FTR the sentiment stands however.

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>
Pygmy Rugger, I don't remember when I said that, I don't know the context of the post. I am not going to go through the day 2 mess again to find out. I am not scum. I have never changed the way I play the game, I have never changed what I say. I am town. Beyond that there is nothing else I can say.
<snip>


You said it in post 1455 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8425538&postcount=1455), and the context was after zuma claimed Mason, which you acknowledged in that post by saying you trusted him 100%. I'm not asking you to wade through day 2, we all know it was a clusterfuck. I am, however, asking you to explain that post. I'm trying to find a different way to interpret you wanting to kill zuma, but that's the only way I can think of.

[Pleonast]

I'm not ready to vote yet -- Pleonast, we're only 24 hours into the 'day', so why should everyone vote right away? Why not wait a bit in hopes of having some new info, instead of relying on what we already know? Especially seeing as how the old level of info just resulted in another town lynch. :(I understand how you feel. But look at the last few days--we ended up rushing a bunch of votes right before the end. That compresses things too much.

I'd rather have everyone have a vote out there. Then we can focus on who's voting for who. I definitely do not want to lynch someone before the deadline.

I'd like to see a voting history of who everyone has voted for. That's better info than the endless accusations.

BTW, NAF, what's the number of votes to start the countdown?

[Rysto]

There's 15 players left, so NAF said it was 8 votes.

[Queuing]

I am not sure I can. I do remember not believing Zuma, or pleonast or BM. The first sentence, how it has only been 4.5 hours leads me to believe that what I meant was IF we trust zuma and pleonast 100%, and that they could have been lieing. That there wasn't enough time elapsed yet for a counterclaim from other masons. Of course this is stupid. All it would take would be one person to counterclaim, we kill the counterclaimer, and find out who was telling the truth. This was explained later on in the day. I think. It was explained in that day, whether it was before or after this post I have no idea. That may have been what I was thinking though. I think it was. However it was a while ago, and I don't 100% remember. Make of that what you will.

[MonkeyMensch]

OK. Back, at last, from the demo job on Ceciltown. I'm going to read the day's posts but can anyone tell me the link to the current spreadsheet? I seem to only have old busted links.

[Kat]

Is hocow even still alive? Hows about Fretful?

Therefore, to try to put some pressure on them I suppose I

unvote brewha
lynch fretful porpentine

Now, this to me is suspicious.

First off, if you're trying the "lynch all lurkers" vote, the two people you mentioned are neither the players with the lowest post counts, nor the players who have gone without posting the longest.

Fretful's last post was yesterday at 9:51 PM (Central Time) and there are 4 living posters with less posts (and she's tied with Pleonast for post count); hocow's last post was on Tuesday at 11:19 am, and she's still beating cowgirl and sturmhauke in post count. (Okay, all the lower players have roleclaimed, but come on, one or both of Aguecheek and cowgirl are Mafia; I'd bet my chocolate chip cookies on it!)

It's also strange to me that, after naming those two, you decided to vote for the one that has posted more, posted more recently, and who's recent posts were more informative and useful. (Fretful did one of your post count analysis assignments, while hocow's last post was "Shit.")

(I'm not yet voting for you, though, because Aguecheek is. Guess I've joined the ArizonaTeach party of worrying about who else is voting for my suspects. :D )

[Kat]

In fact, based solely on my last post, and the fact that no one seems likely to help me vote for my top two suspects, I'm gonna vote for hocow.

Well, that plus the fact that looking at her past posts, she's got a pretty high noise-to-signal ratio: 9 out of her last 25 posts in this thread are "fluff" posts.

[Queuing]

Now, this to me is suspicious.

First off, if you're trying the "lynch all lurkers" vote, the two people you mentioned are neither the players with the lowest post counts, nor the players who have gone without posting the longest.


As you said, the lowest posters have role claimed, and some of them have even been proven.

I didn't vote for hocow because someone else already had, and I was hoping that voting for someone different would get that someone different to speak up.

[Kat]

I don't think a single vote is going to get a person to speak up, especially since Freful hasn't been all that absent recently.

And I was actually also suspicious of hocow based on posts 3115 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494834&postcount=3115), 2869 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8478290&postcount=2869) and 2407 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8454168&postcount=2407), but I wanted to see your reaction to a vote with about as much substance behind it as your vote for Fretful had; it's nice to see you at least aren't being hypocritical and condemning that sort of vote.

In posts 3115 and 2869, hocow stated that Malacandra had been pinging her radar for some time, and that she had stated so before, but post 2407 is the only "FOS" post I was able to find prior to her vote (and the FOS was based on him not commenting on the Autolycus as Godfather discussion).

[Kat]

Of course, now I find out I was wrong. Looking a little further back, I found post 1773 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8434015&postcount=1773), where she mentions it there, too. And who knows, maybe there's more. It was the whole SK accusation/"ho-ly cow" thing. And I was actually involved in that discussion!!! I jumped all over Malacandra for it. And somehow apparently completely forgot it or something. I have never been so embarrassed in all my life.

I will now unvote hocow and slink away to hide under a rock.

:smack: :smack: :smack: :smack: :smack:

[NAF1138]

BTW, NAF, what's the number of votes to start the countdown?

Rysto is correct. 8 to start the clock.

[Aguecheek]

I'm still here. Postin' late at night again.

I'm not too comfortable with the "lynch the lurkers" ideas floating around. Goodness knows I'm nowhere near the most prolific. I think a lot of us have been somewhat surprised that this game takes up as much time as it does. It's a lot easier to read ir when you don't have to really read it.

But I'd still like to here from some of the others besides myself, if nothing else than a "checking in" post.

[hocow]

I'm still here.

Only thing I can think of to add is that I agree that it does seem suspicious that Queuing is still alive. I'm hesitant to say that though because I have had him labeled as most likely town in my head. I'm sure that that may very well be true, and that there are other, non-scummy reasons that he is still alive.

Someone upthread mentioned that the mafia may be trying to get unknown players in an attempt to get the SK. That seems like a good strategy for the mafia, really. But that doesn't explain Queuing as he has only claimed to be vanilla flavored.

Honestly, he is putting alot into his posts and analysis, and I'm unsure that the mafia would put so much work into it. His posts are designed to help the town. Unless he is the SK, and trying to weed out who everybody is to help him achieve victory...

No vote yet, I need to look over a few things, and other players.

[Santo Rugger]

Ok, time to get the ball spinning faster. I'll be voting for whoever hasn't voted, in order of scummiest to least (IMHO). If you don't like it, vote. For now, vote hocow.
<snip>

Oh, yeah, we need to leave ourselves lots of time in between our "final" votes and the end of the Day. The last two Days it's been late-running bandwagons that have led to lynchings, and a lot of players seem to have been caught by surprise by them. I think we should get our votes in 24 hours early.

Seriously, people. Get your votes out there. No, I'm not saying that we should all vote for one person to end the day early. I'm saying votes lead to discussion, which has been very lacking today.

[Santo Rugger]

I'm off to a wedding in Angel Fire (flippin' sweet!), so I won't be around till Sunday.

Cheers,
Pat Garcia

[Rysto]

I don't see much support for this, but I'm going to go ahead and vote for Aguecheek, because of the concerns I've already raised. Namely:

-His role claim is far too convenient and has yet to give us any information with which we can judge his claim
-He inexplicably failed to investigate cowgirl last night, which could have either cleared or condemned her
-He investigated pimaspinner the very same night that Blaster Master was to test pima's claim by killing FCoD, which rendered the investigation useless
-He continued to defend his Day 1 suspicion of sturmhauke after his second investigation came back Town. In other words, he did not breadcrumb his second investigation. In fact, the only breadcrumb he can point to is that one on the first day. AFAICT, he never breadcrumbed the second sturmhauke investigation, or the Blaster Master and pimaspinner investigations.

Here is Queuing's summary of Aguecheek's posts. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8478718&postcount=2884)

As to the Queuing-brewha spat, it's reminding me a lot of Day 2. I think we'd be better off to stay well out of it.

[Rysto]

In fact, the only breadcrumb he can point to is that one on the first day.
Oops, I meant to delete this part. He did FOS Queuing as the SK before his role claim.

[Rysto]

Oh, and I'm going to FOS cowgirl, because I don't believe her role-claim and Aguecheek didn't investigate her. I'm also wondering about Lakai, who included cowgirl the first's posts in her recap of Smitty/cowgirl (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8488362&postcount=3076). Why include a known, dead townie's posts in there?

[Kat]

Oh, thank the gods, someone else is suspicious of Aguecheek! Goody gumdrops. And since it will no longer be a total waste for me to cast this vote anymore...here's hoping I can get a lynch Aguecheek bandwagon rolling.

[Fretful Porpentine]

I didn't vote for hocow because someone else already had, and I was hoping that voting for someone different would get that someone different to speak up.
Well, that strategy generally works better if the someone different isn't halfway across the country with no Internet access at the time you vote for her. Some of us do have real lives that get in the way from time to time, y'know?

Anyway, I remain suspicious of both of the two most recent role claims, but more so of Aguecheek than cowgirl -- I'm pretty sure Menoccio was killed precisely because he was so openly skeptical about Aguecheek's role claim. For now, I'm going to vote Aguecheek.

[Lakai]

Oh, and I'm going to FOS cowgirl, because I don't believe her role-claim and Aguecheek didn't investigate her. I'm also wondering about Lakai, who included cowgirl the first's posts in her recap of Smitty/cowgirl (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8488362&postcount=3076). Why include a known, dead townie's posts in there?
Just in case her behavior is somehow substantially different.

[sturmhauke]

Here's my latest spreadsheet. (http://home.comcast.net/~sturmhauke/mafia.xls) As usual, it includes complete voting records for each poster, who's still alive and who's six feet under, known and suspected roles, and notes on major events. I'll be back in a bit for analysis.

[Aguecheek]

-His role claim is far too convenient and has yet to give us any information with which we can judge his claimPardon me for not role claiming earlier. And next time I'll ask Naf to let me know if my investigation result was true or not. That should help.

-He inexplicably failed to investigate cowgirl last night, which could have either cleared or condemned her.Hold on here. You're looking at me askance because I did investigate Blaster Master and pimaspinner after they role claimed, and now because I didn't investigate cowgirl? I'm trying to decide who to investigate based on what the town wants. I investigated MonkeyMensch because Queuing had asked me earlier why I hadn't and there's been a lot of people curious about him the last couple of days. Apparently, I made the wrong choice. My sincere apologies.

-He investigated pimaspinner the very same night that Blaster Master was to test pima's claim by killing FCoD, which rendered the investigation uselessSee above. I did investigate pima and I'm scummy. I didn't investigate cowgirl and I'm scummy. I wanted an independent confirmation of pimaspinner's claim. We've agreed that this role sucks for determining roles, but pretty good for confirming them. Have you thought about the fact that we'd been doing so badly that the Mafia might have deemed it a good idea to throw us a bone? Why not get as much confirmation as possible when the only thing a blind investigation will get us is more confusion?

-He continued to defend his Day 1 suspicion of sturmhauke after his second investigation came back Town. In other words, he did not breadcrumb his second investigation. In fact, the only breadcrumb he can point to is that one on the first day. AFAICT, he never breadcrumbed the second sturmhauke investigation, or the Blaster Master and pimaspinner investigations.Again, I'm sorry I didn't read the chapter on Breadcrumbs when reading my handy "How to Play a Cop in a Mafia Game" handbook. I'd imagine the fact that I didn't push for sturmhauke's lynching after the second night would be a pretty good indication that I didn't think he was worth pursuing. And how am I supposed to "breadcrumb" the fact that I didn't find anything suspicious about a couple of other investigations? I didn't realize I was supposed to leave breadcrumbs (CaerieD's turned out to be a rousing success). What better way to indicate that I didn't feel suspicious of them then by not voting for them?

And since it will no longer be a total waste for me to cast this vote anymore...here's hoping I can get a lynch Aguecheek bandwagon rolling.Classy. Wait for someone else to start it and jump on. Making sure you're not the first one to vote for me, huh? Good idea. People don't care for that.

[sturmhauke]

So we had another last minute speedlynch of an innocent person. This time it was due to cowgirl's claiming to be the Guardian Angel and votes shifting onto Malacandra, with even less time on the clock than the day before (link) (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8484041&postcount=2999). Prior to this, the current votes were as follows:

4 votes - cowgirl (Kat, Pygmy Rugger, StarvingButStrong, Pleonast)
3 votes - brewha (Lakai, Fretful Porpentine, Menocchio)
2 votes - Aguecheek (MonkeyMensch, sturmhauke)
2 votes - Malacandra (ArizonaTeach, hocow)
1 vote - Lakai (brewha)
1 vote - MonkeyMensch (Queuing)
1 vote - Pygmy Rugger (storyteller0910)
1 vote - Queuing (Aguecheek)

All times are PST.

(1) 7:33 am - cowgirl makes GA claim, votes Malacandra (causes brewha and Malacandra to be tied at 3 votes)
(2) 7:51 am - Queuing unvotes MonkeyMensch, votes brewha (pushes brewha ahead to 4 votes, tying cowgirl for the lead)
(3) 8:14 am - Pleonast unvotes cowgirl, votes Malacandra (swaps Malacandra and cowgirl in the polls)
(4) 8:14 am - brewha unvotes Lakai, votes Queuing
(5) 8:24 am - StarvingButStrong unvotes cowgirl, votes Queuing
(6) 8:27 am - brewha unvotes Queuing, votes Malacandra (ensures his own safety by bumping Malacandra to the lead)
8:30 am - polls closed
9:02 am - Malacandra lynched

Final vote tally:

5 votes - Malacandra (ArizonaTeach, brewha, cowgirl, hocow, Pleonast)
4 votes - brewha (Lakai, Fretful Porpentine, Menocchio, Queuing)
2 votes - Aguecheek (MonkeyMensch, sturmhauke)
2 votes - cowgirl (Kat, Pygmy Rugger)
2 votes - Queuing (Aguecheek, StarvingButStrong)
1 vote - Pygmy Rugger (storyteller0910)

What does this all mean? That’s the million-dollar question right now. Aguecheek and cowgirl are both somehow still alive despite being high-value targets, if they’re telling the truth. brewha apparently voted for Queuing in an effort to bump someone else up the polls, despite there being more likely candidates. Then he realized his tactical error and voted for Malacandra to clinch it. Meanwhile, Queuing has been practically shouting down all opposition.

Here’s what I think: They’re all scum of one sort or another. Queuing seems the most likely SK of the bunch, the rest are probably Mafia. Consider: brewha has cast exactly one vote for Aguecheek (day 5), and none for cowgirl (either version). Aguecheek and cowgirl have never voted for each other, or for brewha. Combine that with the iffy last-minute claims the past two days, both of which are directly responsible for townie deaths, and I think it makes a good case.

Maybe I’m flailing around in the dark, but frankly I’m getting tired of this game. It goes from utter chaos to sluggish summaries of posting histories, and not much in between. So screw it, I’ve laid out my reasons, and now I’m voting.

For today, vote Queuing. After that, I would strongly suggest we lynch Aguecheek, brewha, and cowgirl.

[StarvingButStrong]

Okay, I had a stretch of insomnia and spent it mulling the game over. No blinding insights, but here's what seemed sensible. (To me, at 3 a.m., take it for what it's worth.)


1) Just coming up with a 'most likely' mafia candidate to vote for isn't good enough. Besides that, you should probably list/explain your second and third (and more if you've got 'em) suspicions.

Because by nightfall there will only be 14 of us left, and two will die overnight (assuming we don't lynch the SK.) One out of seven chances you'll wake up dead -- if you have anything worth saying, best do it 'today.'

2) To allow time for everyone to air their suspicions, we ABSOLUTELY should not start a lynch countdown too early. Remember, we seem to have some people who can't/don't get involved on the weekend. This doesn't mean we can't have a whole slew of 'want to vote for' the same person. Just after a candidate gets to 5 or 6 votes, the other votes for him should NOT be cast in blue. (Maybe use Cyan instead? Eye catching, clearly of the blue persuasion, so people will know you mean to vote that way WITHOUT starting the clock early.)


3) We seem to have settled on a 'worst case' of there now being 1 SK, 5 mafia (including GF), and 9 town. AT THE MOMENT the numbers should mean it would be easier for the SK to win by killing off the mafia. However, say we lynch town (again, ::sigh:: ) and two more townies die tonight. At 1/5/6 the SK would pretty much HAVE to shift to killing townies. Deliberately, I mean, not just 'collateral damage' killings.

We have GOT to kill Mafia today or I think we've lost.

I say Mafia rather than SK, because

A) I think our chances of getting one are better because First, there are more Mafia than SK and so 5/15 is better odds than 1/15 and Second, Mafia have been anti-town all along while the SK had no reason to go after townies instead of mafia, at least until very recently, and so our chances of finding him/her based on voting records seem slim.

B) We know the Mafia also want the SK dead as much as we do. If the SK is still in the game tonight, likely they'll be shooting for the SK instead of a townie. If they manage to get it right, bonus for us.

I realize the danger of having the SK alive is rising rapidly, I just think our best shot of winning is for this to happen: we lynch mafia today, SK kills mafia tonight, mafia kills SK tonight. (Um. If the mafia do target the SK, does his target die? I think so....) Anyway, then dawn would find us with:

3 Mafia /9 town

Wouldn't THAT be great?


This post is getting long -- I'll put my other two points on the next rock.

[StarvingButStrong]

4) I think it's time we killed Aguecheek. I've had him on my suspected-mafia list almost the entire game. And, yes, if we kill him we are potentially killing a beat cop, but A) there's not much time left for a beat cop to be of any use to the town and B) Ague cheek in particular hasn't been of any noticeable benefit to the town so far.

Add bad choices on who to investigate to the fact that the Mafia haven't gone after him to my gut.... Lynch Ague cheek.



5) Despite the above, I think Aguecheek might have been on the money in this post. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8498109&postcount=3148)

Why not? As Mafia, Aguecheek wants the SK dead. Yes, the Mafia could have killed Queuing themselves, but maybe they were hoping we'd do the job for them (like I'm hoping they'll do it for us) OR maybe Ague cheek was as unable to convince the Mafia he was right as he was unable to sell it to us. Or maybe there was just a more persuasive Mafia member with a different SK target in mind.

And...I think that's it for now.

[StarvingButStrong]

For today, vote Queuing. After that, I would strongly suggest we lynch Aguecheek, brewha, and cowgirl.

It's a worthy list. :)

Can you explain to me why going after the SK before a Mafia makes sense? I laid out my reasons for the other order a post or two ago -- but, hey, this is my first game, and I've been wrong about other aspects already.

If you can make the case for SK first, I'll switch my vote.

[Rysto]

Hold on here. You're looking at me askance because I did investigate Blaster Master and pimaspinner after they role claimed, and now because I didn't investigate cowgirl? I'm trying to decide who to investigate based on what the town wants.
I never said anything against your investigation of Blaster Master. At the time, there wasn't much evidence in favour of his claim. It was unfortunate that you and pima both investigated him, but not entirely unexpected.

An investigation of cowgirl would have been similarly useful. We have no other way of testing her claim.

However, your investigation of pimaspinner wasn't very useful. What would you have said if FCoD was scum but pima came back Mafia? In all likelihood, that would indicate that your investigation was wrong. If FCoD was Town, then he would have been a Miller, which would make it even more likely that pima was a beat cop. After all, what are the chances that a Mafioso would randomly choose a Miller out of all the townspeople?

Have you thought about the fact that we'd been doing so badly that the Mafia might have deemed it a good idea to throw us a bone?
Sacrifice a Mafioso to save the life of a Mafioso? I hardly see how that's a good trade for the Mafia. It might be a good move if pima had been the Godfather, but if pima was the Godfather, your investigation was worthless.

[Kat]

We have GOT to kill Mafia today or I think we've lost.

I say Mafia rather than SK, because

A) I think our chances of getting one are better because First, there are more Mafia than SK and so 5/15 is better odds than 1/15 and Second, Mafia have been anti-town all along while the SK had no reason to go after townies instead of mafia, at least until very recently, and so our chances of finding him/her based on voting records seem slim.

B) We know the Mafia also want the SK dead as much as we do. If the SK is still in the game tonight, likely they'll be shooting for the SK instead of a townie. If they manage to get it right, bonus for us.

I realize the danger of having the SK alive is rising rapidly, I just think our best shot of winning is for this to happen: we lynch mafia today, SK kills mafia tonight, mafia kills SK tonight. (Um. If the mafia do target the SK, does his target die? I think so....) Anyway, then dawn would find us with:

3 Mafia /9 town

Wouldn't THAT be great?

I sorta disagree with this one. I mean, I agree with Point A, and I agree that it would be great if we were to kill Mafia today, and SK were to kill Mafia tonight, and the Mafia were to kill the SK tonight, but I disagree with Point B. We DON'T know if the Mafia are shooting for the SK yet (Unless one of them wants to reveal their role and tell us they are? *makes puppy-dog eyes in the direction of suspected Mafia members* *sighs* Didn't think so...) and we DON'T know that they have any better an idea than we do who it is (although they do have a smaller number to choose from). Face it, the SK's been pretty damn good at hiding throughout this game. Add to that, we also don't know that the SK is going to target Mafia or whether the SK will hit a Mafia if they are.

So my question now is, sturmhauke, how sure are you on that Queuing as SK theory?

[Kat]

Okay, just for fun:

Other than sturmhauke's FOS towards Queuing above, I found the following SK identity theories:

-In 3249 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8506739&postcount=3249), storyteller fingers brewha as a possible SK, on the "One player has reason to avoid lynching at any and all costs." theory.
-In several posts, including 3148 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8498109&postcount=3148) and 3167 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8499942&postcount=3167), Aguecheek fingers Queuing as SK, based on his posting summary listed in 3133, 3134 & 3135 (I haven't linked them, just scroll up from 3148).
-In 3114 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494675&postcount=3114), ArizonaTeach posts the possibility that StarvingButStrong may be SK, based on the posting summary of SBS from 3094 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8490347&postcount=3094).
-In 3115 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494834&postcount=3115), hocow mentions that she thought Fretful was SK, but admits ArizonaTeach might be right about SBS. Hey, hocow, what made you suspect Fretful?
-Someone other than Malacandra had thought hocow was the SK, but I can't find that post right now. Does anyone remember who it was?

Both Queuing and StarvingButStrong are currently saying that flushing out the SK isn't important right now, and both Queuing and brewha are arguing against being SK. SBS, Fretful and hocow have not been suspected by multiple people (disregarding Malacandra's suspicion). (One player (hocow) posted that the SBS accusation may be right, but it isn't clear if she's supporting the suspicion, or just the logic behind it.)

Aguecheek is arguing most vehemetly against Queuing, but seeing as how I'm currently suspecting Aguecheek of Mafia-ness, I can't decide if he just wants Queuing out of the picture, or if he truly thinks Queuing is SK and wants the town to take care of it for him.

Assigned reading assignment: post 3158 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8498718&postcount=3158) for Pleonasts' argument on needing to kill the SK soon:
Add in the SK. Each excess Town death (a Townie killed either by us or the SK) brings us closer to losing. If the SK kills a Townie each night, assuming the best case of us lynching a Mafia each day, we'll have eliminated the Mafia, 4 vs 0 after 5 days. So we can win if we lynch only Mafia or the SK each night, no matter what they do.

If we lynch one Townie by mistake, the outcome can go either way. If we get the SK early, we're ok. If we make the mistake early, and fail to get the SK until later, we'll lose, unless the SK kills more Mafia than Town. Basically, if we lynch one more Townie, it's the SK's game to lose.

[Fretful Porpentine]

I don't think Queuing can be the SK; he posts way too much and has drawn too much attention to himself. There are plausible reasons why a Mafia member might want to do this, but the only winning strategy for the SK is to post just enough to avoid looking suspicious and otherwise stay off of everyone's radar. Once he's dead, that's it, and more visibility = greater chance of getting lynched or night-killed.

[MonkeyMensch]

I'm voting Aguecheek, again, and this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8505913&postcount=3243) helps me vote that way.

If Aguecheek is scum then this post benefits them two ways. If I die first then Aguecheek gets a bump of believability as a cop since he investigated me and came up town. If Aguecheek dies first then the mafia gets a good shot at a townie lynch when suspicion comes my way as it would appear that he was covering for a fellow mafioso.

If Aquecheek is not scum then I have helped screw things up. I'm willing to bet my vote that it is the former case presented. I've voted for him before and do so now again. Please be scum...

[Kat]

I don't think Queuing can be the SK; he posts way too much and has drawn too much attention to himself. There are plausible reasons why a Mafia member might want to do this, but the only winning strategy for the SK is to post just enough to avoid looking suspicious and otherwise stay off of everyone's radar. Once he's dead, that's it, and more visibility = greater chance of getting lynched or night-killed.

Very true. And brewha is currently the 3rd highest poster (right behind zuma). I see just the opposite problem with SK suspicions of you, StarvingButStrong and hocow, especially as all 3 of you were called for low posting multiple times by Queuing. SBS is right in the middle of the pack now, and you're a bit below average, but you'd think (or at least I do) that if the SK was in that low-posting list that Queuing kept bringing up, they'd have rectified it at least after he called for a Vig kill on someone on the list.

If it weren't for the fact that Lakai came up town when pimaspinner investigated, I'd strongly consider him for SK. He doesn't say much that's controversial, and his post count is firmly middle-of-the-road: 38 posts per Queuing's list in 1795 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8435070&postcount=1795) put him just a bit below the average and current post count of 94 is right in the middle again.

Or maybe it's Rysto. He's off everyone's radar. ;)

[Queuing]

I am drunk now, and home at my GFs house, happy that NJ just scored, but here is what I wanted to post before I left to watch the game:

Well I don't have much to add. I don't like aguecheek's idea of "mafia throwing us a bone". Why would they do this? Why would you throw a bone to your competition? This makes no sense to me at all. The mere idea is very silly to me as well.

I am not the SK. I don't know why the scum haven't killed me yet. I think its because they are pretty sure the town will do it for them. I think that is why they have been killing the people they have. Either because they were roles that could cause them so trouble (cops/mason/vig) or townies who have been quiet and hence not likely to be lynched. They want to each day to be a twofer for them.

Based on this thinking, there is someone who has should have been a threat to them. This person is the cop. He isn't dead. I find this more suspicious then my being left alive.

unvote fretfuk porpentine
lynch aguecheek

I don't know how to answer your FOS sturmhauke. You seem to think I am the SK. All I can say is I am not. I hate the SK role. I think the SK has a very good chance of winning this game, and that is because there is no way to tell who is the SK. No tells.

I will not be here again until tomorrow night, FYI.

[Rysto]

I am drunk now, and home at my GFs house, happy that NJ just scored,
Now there's a scummy thing to post. ;)

[Kat]

Now I wanna know what made Queuing change his "believe all role claims" strategy so suddenly.

[Kat]

What's the current vote count?

[Rysto]

By my count, it's:

Aguecheek - 5 (Rysto, Kat, Fretful Porcupine, Monkey Mensch, Queuing)
Queuing - 4 (brewha, Aguecheek, Pygmy Rugger, sturmhauke)
brewha - 1 (Lakai)
hocow - 1 (Pleonast)

[Kat]

Ah. So Queuing did violate his "believe all claims" strategy to save his own neck. Now I need to have a bit of a think about this...

[StarvingButStrong]

By my count, it's:

Aguecheek - 5 (Rysto, Kat, Fretful Porcupine, Monkey Mensch, Queuing)
Queuing - 4 (brewha, Aguecheek, Pygmy Rugger, sturmhauke)
brewha - 1 (Lakai)
hocow - 1 (Pleonast)


I thought I voted for Aguecheek in 3319 -- but now I see somehow I screwed up the color. Let me try again:

Vote Aguecheek

[Queuing]

Ah. So Queuing did violate his "believe all claims" strategy to save his own neck. Now I need to have a bit of a think about this...

Yes and no. I knew I was on the block, and it seemed that my vote for Fretful wasn't doing much. S/He came in and said they were halfway across the world and real life was interfering. Which for all I know is true. Personally I am getting somewhat tired of the "real life is interfering" excuse, as we have had a couple RL days here, and still not that much action from some of the people.

Plus I don't believe his role claim, and even if its true he has done a crap job of using that role, so on balance I don't think we lose much if he dies.

I would prefer to lynch on of the less prolific posters however.

[storyteller0910]

How much longer do we have until the deadline? I'm not thrilled with either of the primary targets. In particular, the reasoning behind the nineteenth attempt to lynch Queuing is almost completely opaque to me. No one has yet made a case against Queuing that reads to me like anything more than "he posts a lot and he's been wrong a lot and therefore he makes an easy target, let's lynch him." I realize I'm going to look awfully bad if he turns out to be scum, but I just don't get this line of attack.

Augecheek seems like a slightly more defensible lynch. He's still alive, and someone (most likely Mafia) killed pima the first chance they had. On the other hand, by the time pima was killed, we had by and large accepted her role claim, hadn't we? Because we've (I think reasonably) questioned Aguecheek's claim basically since he made it, I can see a motivation for the Mafia to leave him alive if he's a for-realsies Cop; we might kill him for them. Plus, the Beat Cop investigations haven't exactly helped us as a town so far.

That said, if time is as short as I think it is, and if no one is interested in looking at candidates other than the two at top of the list right now (and why not, for crying out loud; why do we keep riding the same horses Day after Day while allowing the less prominent folks to completely escape scrutiny?), I guess I'd prefer an Aguecheek lynch to a Queuing.

How much time is left?

[StarvingButStrong]

The day ends in exactly 120 hours. 11:30 Monday pacific time.


And just because I have nothing better to do this morning, here is NAF's list of remaining players, with how many posts they have made since the start of this 'day' added by me:

brewha - 18
Queuing - 14
Rysto - 14
Kat - 12
StarvingButStrong - 8
Storyteller0910 - 6
Lakai - 5
Aguecheek - 4
Pygmy Rugger - 4
Fretful Porpentine - 3
Pleonast - 3
MonkeyMensch - 2
Sturmhauke - 2
hocow - 1
cowgirl - 0


Which shows, what? Brewha defends himself vigorously when under suspicion. Queuing posts a lot all the time. The 'cows' are being very quiet. I manage to post at a better clip when I don't have to spend a ten hour stretch away from the internet. Others post relatively less on weekends.

IOW, I don't think post counts mean a whole lot.

[Rysto]

Well, three players have yet to vote. Get those votes in now, people, so we have time for final discussions before the lynch. I don't want to see a last-minute bandwagon take the lead -- I'll regard that as very scummy(and yes, I do realize that I helped start a last-minute bandwagon 2 Days ago).

[MonkeyMensch]

[rp off]
I just got back this weekend after a week plus out of town. I should be more conversational tomorrow, if I live at all, 'cause I have some medium down-time.
[/rp off]

[Kat]

That said, if time is as short as I think it is, and if no one is interested in looking at candidates other than the two at top of the list right now (and why not, for crying out loud; why do we keep riding the same horses Day after Day while allowing the less prominent folks to completely escape scrutiny?), I guess I'd prefer an Aguecheek lynch to a Queuing.

How much time is left?

Who's your preferred candidate for lynching? You earlier listed brewha as your pick for SK, but who's your top choice for Mafia right now?

[brewha]

I gotta say I'm a bit conflicted. I put Aguecheek pretty near the top of my list as scum. I really don't believe his role claim. Since he has voted for Queuing, presumably they are on different sides. So, unless one of them is the SK, one of my suspicions are wrong.

[NAF1138]

hey, sorry I haven't been around much this game day. the past week has been a little crazy.

that said, we haven't hit the magicc countdown number yet, Aguecheeck is in the lead vote wise (i am posting from my phone so I don't have an exact count, but I believe it is 7 votes.) and cowgirl and howcow need to make some posts in the next few hours. I don't know if I could even find a replacement this close to the end of the game, so I am not sure what I am going to do if they don't make their posts. I will think on it and get back to y'all.

I will make a proper post in 2 hours or so when I get home

[Santo Rugger]

I gotta say I'm a bit conflicted. I put Aguecheek pretty near the top of my list as scum. I really don't believe his role claim. Since he has voted for Queuing, presumably they are on different sides. So, unless one of them is the SK, one of my suspicions are wrong.

I think, of brewha, Queuing, and Ague, one is scum, one is town, and one is the SK. I think Ague is scum, because of the absurdness of his role claim.

The fact that Queuing talks to much to be the SK keeps being brought up. But perhaps Queuing knows that that we would assume the SK wouldn't talk to much. Double think is a bitch.

However, there have been some pretty darn good arguments presented showing specific reasons that brewha might be the SK.

If Ague's not the cop, I don't see any reason the Mafia won't take him out tonight. If he were town, he most likely wouldn't falsely claim cop. Even if we don't fully trust his claim, assuming for a momment he actually is the cop, he's still getting information for the town. I say we give him another night. If he lives through the night, we'll get some more info from him. The mob won't let him live forever, because as the town gets smaller, a cops info becomes more relavent. In summary, they have every reason to kill him soon; if he is scum and doesn't die soon, we've already identified him for a lynch in the very near future.

For that reason, and the reason in my second paragraph, my vote for Queuing stands. Tomorrow, I will most likely target brewha, and Ague if he's still alive the next day.

Finally, I am still suspicious of cowgirl for reasons I've presented earlier. Her lack of participation today only fuels that suspicion.

[Queuing]

Who's your preferred candidate for lynching? You earlier listed brewha as your pick for SK, but who's your top choice for Mafia right now?

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but I agree yet again with storyteller. I also would much rather get one of the lurkers then the potential cop, or me of course.

So my answer to this question is hocow, fretful porpentine or pygmy rugger. The first 2 because of the lack of recent posting mostly. The case against them has also been laid it previously, and while it wasn't necessarily convincing then I am finding it more so in light of their recent (in)actions. The 3rd because storyteller said he was scum and kept voting for him (reminiscent of his FCOD call).

I won't unvote aguecheek yet, mostly because we need to get scum today. I know I am not scum, and therefore I will not unvote someone who I don't know is town when it will cause someone I know is town (namely me) to die.

[StarvingButStrong]

I won't unvote aguecheek yet, mostly because we need to get scum today. I know I am not scum, and therefore I will not unvote someone who I don't know is town when it will cause someone I know is town (namely me) to die.


Isn't this the same type of reasoning you called Brewha out for? If it was scummy for brewha, isn't it scummy for you?

[Queuing]

Isn't this the same type of reasoning you called Brewha out for? If it was scummy for brewha, isn't it scummy for you?

Well that is up for you to decide. I called brewha out for switching his vote to someone who he said he didn't necessarily think was scum, but was doing so to save his skin. Personally I do not believe aguecheek's claim, and I happen to think he is scum, therefore I don't mind leaving my vote on him. I would prefer to vote for someone else. I stated this. I won't try unvote aguecheek and kill a known townie. So no, I don't think I am doing the samething brewha was doing. If you want to go ahead, vote for me. To be honest I am getting very close to not caring.

[Kat]

Personally I do not believe aguecheek's claim, and I happen to think he is scum, therefore I don't mind leaving my vote on him.

Well, you say this now, but a couple of days ago, you were saying:
I voted for you to save our cop.
and
Do you mean because I tried to not get aguecheek killed?

What exactly was it that made you change your mind about believing role claims in general and Aguecheek's in particular?

And this is now officially weirding me out, because I am voting for Aguecheek myself! but the sudden jump from calling Aguecheek "our cop" to voting for Aguecheek right when he's tied with Queuing for votes and [i]not[/n] believing Aguecheek's (with a side trip into "lynch the lurkers" land) just rings badly to me. The timing just strikes me as awfully convenient for him to suddenly reverse his strategy like that.

[Kat]

That should be "and not believing Aguecheek's role claim (with a side trip into "lynch the lurkers" land)"

Damn the no-edit rule!

[Santo Rugger]

Isn't this the same type of reasoning you called Brewha out for? If it was scummy for brewha, isn't it scummy for you?

That was my very first thought after I read his statement, also. "Do as I say, not as I do."

[MonkeyMensch]

I think I'm misreading this: ... If Ague's not the cop, I don't see any reason the Mafia won't take him out tonight. If he were town, he most likely wouldn't falsely claim cop. ...
I'm reading that as, "If Ague's vanilla townie the Mafia will probably kill him tonight. But if he were vanilla townie he wouldn't have false-claimed cop and is therefore Mafia."

Can you clarify?

[Santo Rugger]

I think I'm misreading this:
I'm reading that as, "If Ague's vanilla townie the Mafia will probably kill him tonight. But if he were vanilla townie he wouldn't have false-claimed cop and is therefore Mafia."

Can you clarify?

Yes, MM, you're pretty much spot on. If he's not Mafia, I can't comprehend any scenario where he lives through the night.

[Lakai]

Yes, MM, you're pretty much spot on. If he's not Mafia, I can't comprehend any scenario where he lives through the night.

How about the mafia trying to go after the SK, while getting the town to lynch him?

[storyteller0910]

Who's your preferred candidate for lynching? You earlier listed brewha as your pick for SK, but who's your top choice for Mafia right now?

Well, I'd like to go after Pygmy Rugger, because I still think he's most likely to be Mafia of all the candidates we have right now. Witness his quick leap into the brewha vs. Queuing donnybrook earlier today. As I've said in the past, I think encouraging this sort of one-on-one battle, even voting for one of the participants, is either woefully misguided or scummy. But I've brought his name up three days running, and no one seems to agree with me on this one, so I think I'm going to need to drop it, at least for now.

I'd vote for brewha, but in this case my theory that he is the SK clashes against my resolution to avoid voting for anyone who gets in a big public feud (although of course, that can now be used against me if scum start picking fights with townies to escape suspicion, so I reserve the right to change this approach at any time). At all events, I'm not totally sure it is to our benefit to kill the SK yet. This sounds counterintuitive, but here's my thought process: the Mafia doesn't want the SK to win any more than we do. They will be trying to kill him/her as we get closer to endgame. If the Mafia is shooting for the SK, then they are not targeting known townies, which improves our chances overall in the endgame. Hell, sooner or later the Mafia may have to sacrifice one of their own on purpose, as Rysto suggested, if the numbers get close and they are worried about an SK win.

Once we catch one or two more Mafia, then the SK becomes a more urgent issue for us, but for the moment we're better off identifying the crooked-nose types than the lunatic basement-dweller.

So I'd rather vote for Pygmy Rugger. I'd rather start examining some of the people who we haven't examined much at all, instead of the usual suspects all the time. But there are only a few hours left until the deadline, and neither a vote for PR nor a vote for someone off the radar is going to be productive.

That said, I'm going to vote Aguecheekfor now, unless I see real movement toward something I like better. If he is scum, great! If not, at least it will remove the need to talk about him every damn day, and allow us to have more productive conversations that focus on a greater variety of potential targets.

[Queuing]

Well, I'd like to go after Pygmy Rugger, because I still think he's most likely to be Mafia of all the candidates we have right now. Witness his quick leap into the brewha vs. Queuing donnybrook earlier today. As I've said in the past, I think encouraging this sort of one-on-one battle, even voting for one of the participants, is either woefully misguided or scummy. But I've brought his name up three days running, and no one seems to agree with me on this one, so I think I'm going to need to drop it, at least for now.

For whatever it might be worth I too would be more then willing to vote for someone beside aguecheek. I just don't know who the most likely person that would be.

FTR, I never said that I believed aguecheek. Just like I never said that I believed chrisk. I still would rather him not die, but I can't vote for myself can I? If you think I am scum go ahead, vote for me, put me out of my misery. I am getting weary always defending myself, and if I make it through and if yet again someone tries to get the lynch me bandwagon going I am very tempted to just let it happen.

[brewha]

If he is scum, great! If not, at least it will remove the need to talk about him every damn day, and allow us to have more productive conversations that focus on a greater variety of potential targets.

Both you and Queuing need to be more careful about how you word things. It has already been discussed how Queuing's statement about saving his own neck closely paralleled my own.

But, now there's this statement. I got jumped on for suggesting we lynch Queuing because if he is town, he seems to be leading us in the wrong direction. I said the town would be better off without him. Isn't this pretty much what you are saying? I don't know for sure if Aguecheek is town or not, but we are coming down to the wire here. If we make two more mistakes, we lose.

I think it's a safe bet that there is 4 or 5 mafia left. I'm pretty sure Queuing, Lakai, and Pygmy Rugger are three of them. It wouldn't surprise me if Aguecheek were one or if one of the less vocal participants were one as well.

Lurking seems to be a pretty good strategy. I was not suspected at all until I started posting more. I'm going to look into those with fewer posts.

[brewha]

One other thing before dishes, though...


Originally Posted by brewha
Folks, I say we take out Queuing today. He appears to be taking the role as the town leader since Blaster Master's demise. And he has been wrong. Either maliciously or mistakenly, he has been wrong. We've done nothing but lynch town folk and we've done so following his lead.

Regardless of his affiliation, the town would be better off without him.

Vote Queuing


Does this sentence make any sense to anyone unless my theory is right and brewha is the SK? At this stage of the game, lynching a townie just because he's made incorrect guesses would not be good for the town at all. We're getting down to the nitty gritty here - we can't afford to keep killing townspeople "regardless of [their] affiliation. It sounds, again, like all brewha cares about is keeping himself alive and getting rid of anyone who points suspicion, no matter how lightly, toward brewha.

Huh, it seems you were the one who called me on it. Queuing attacks me for saving my own neck then does the same.

Storyteller attacks me for voting for someone that is either scum or at least bad for the town - then does the same.

I think I may have found my final mafia member.

[cowgirl]

Okay, I'm back. I couldn't access the boards for about 24 hours Friday-Saturday (was it just me?) and I was at an all-day meeting on Sunday. And I haven't the slightest idea when the deadline is, it hasn't been posted for the last many pages. can someone please tell me?

Storyteller makes a good argument about Brewha playing for himself in post 3249 ( http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8506739&postcount=3249). Problem is I keep on agreeing with Brewha:

- that it is odd that after all this time, super-helpful Queueing is still alive, and his record of pointing out scum isn't that good. He is either mafia or a bad judge of character (although the same could be said for any one of us!)

and I don't know why you guys can't see what I'm seeing. We're getting manipulated by a very skilled set of mafia. I tell you what. Lynch Queuing or Lakai. If either one of them turns up town, I walk to the gallows, put the noose round my neck and happily leap off the platform. Because if they're town, I got no clue what to do next.

I have been convinced of Storyteller's towniness from the very first day because he seems to restate my thoughts better than I ever could. However, I respectfully think he's wrong about Brewha.

Now, some of you have connected me with Aguecheek but I really understand why.

If you are correct that either Aguecheek or I are scum, I know I am not, then Aguecheek must be.

I don't know anything about Ag, but I do know that I am town. So if my opinion on this is worth anything, I will vote Aguecheek, but I don't want to do it officially until I know when the deadline is. Anyone?

[Santo Rugger]

How about the mafia trying to go after the SK, while getting the town to lynch him?

Well, it depends on if you think the Mafia would be willing to take the chance of having one of their own exposed by a beat cop tonight. It might be a good gambit, though, because they might want to use the cop to help them find the SK.

[cowgirl]

Random thoughts and a vote count:

- The problem is, there are no 100% convincing arguments to be made about anybody; if there were, they would have been made already.

- Sturmhauke's helpful spreadsheet shows that all of us have voted for town and all of us have voted for scum too.

- I am as surprised as anyone that I am still alive.

- Queueing is either playing very well and hiding in plain sight, or playing very well and unwittingly making himself look suspicious. I have seen enough evidence to be convinced either way, and am not smart enough to decide which.

Vote count:
Aguecheek - 7 (Rysto, Kat, Fretful Porcupine, Monkey Mensch, Queuing, StarvingButStrong, storyteller)
Queuing - 4 (brewha, Aguecheek, Pygmy Rugger, sturmhauke)
brewha - 1 (Lakai)
hocow - 1 (Pleonast)

Deadline is this morning. I don't want to push Aguecheek over the edge, the only reason I would vote that way is in the hopes that it will demonstrate my innocence. I'm rereading to see if someone else jumps out at me enough to make an argument convincing enough to put someone else over the top, but I'm not holding my breath.

[storyteller0910]

Huh, it seems you were the one who called me on it. Queuing attacks me for saving my own neck then does the same.

Storyteller attacks me for voting for someone that is either scum or at least bad for the town - then does the same.

I think I may have found my final mafia member.

Dude, you need to calm down. Not everyone is Mafia.

My objection to your behavior, fundamentally, was not so much that you change your vote very frequently "regardless of affiliation." It is that you appear to be playing - like Autolycus - for yourself. Your primary motivation always seems to be to stay alive at any cost: you switch your votes to your nearest competition when you are in danger, you post very defensively, and you frantically FoS anyone with the temerity to look at you funny. I think you've been playing a very out-for-yourself kind of game, which I think is consistent with the SK. It could also be consistent with someone playing like Autolycus, who was a townie, so I am reserving judgment for the moment.

[storyteller0910]

Okay, I'm back. I couldn't access the boards for about 24 hours Friday-Saturday (was it just me?)

No, I had that problem, too. Some kind of vague message about "fixing a problem" and no access.


I have been convinced of Storyteller's towniness from the very first day because he seems to restate my thoughts better than I ever could. However, I respectfully think he's wrong about Brewha.


I don't know what I think about brewha anymore. As I said in my next-to-last post, I really thought that he was the SK, but then I can't really see why the SK would run around drawing attention to himself and basically aligning himself against so many people, as brewha has today. I don't know.


Now, some of you have connected me with Aguecheek but I really understand why. If you are correct that either Aguecheek or I are scum, I know I am not, then Aguecheek must be.


I still believe that both, neither, or one of you may be scum. I still do not understand why you didn't protect pimaspinner a few nights ago, which is my chief reason for disbelieving your claim of GA. I know you were just catching up, but I'm assuming NAF would have allowed the Night to last as long as you needed to read the thread and make a choice. It seemed terribly obvious at the time that pima was on her way out that Night, and the primary reason I am suspicious of you and your claim is this. It is a nagging, not a powerful, suspicion, but there it is.

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>
Deadline is this morning. I don't want to push Aguecheek over the edge, the only reason I would vote that way is in the hopes that it will demonstrate my innocence. I'm rereading to see if someone else jumps out at me enough to make an argument convincing enough to put someone else over the top, but I'm not holding my breath.

So you think scum wouldn't vote for each other, "in the hopes that it will demonstrate their innocence"? :dubious:

[brewha]

The problem is that at this stage of the game playing for the town and playing for myself are essentially the same thing. If the SK keeps going after town and the mafia fail to kill the SK, we have two days to lynch mafia. Lets say that there is four mafia left. That means that there is 10 town and one SK. If we lynch town, it's down to 9(town)-1(SK)-4(Mafia). Tonight it goes to 7-1-4, if we screw up again tomorrow, it's 6-1-4. If the SK and Mafia kills town we all lose. It's the same scenario even if there is 5 mafia, except on the final night, only the SK needs to kill town. IE 10-1-5; 8-1-5; 7-1-5; 5-1-5.

I know I'm town and I am going to defend myself if anyone suspects me. I know that my death leads us one step closer to losing. I've invested way to much time in this game to go down without a fight.

[brewha]

Wish I could edit. The second scenario should say that it is the same scenario even if there is 5 mafia. There shouldn't be a caveat.

And, that post was in response to Storyteller's post (3359).

[brewha]

Let's try again, the second scenario would have the caveat, but I got the numbers wrong. It should be: 9-1-5; 7-1-5; 6-1-5; 4-1-5.

Regardless of my screwed up math and logic. We have today and tomorrow to kill mafia. If we don't, we likely lose.

[cowgirl]

I am still looking for reasons to be convinced about Aguecheek.

For some reason folks don't like my bringing up very old posts as evidence. Frankly it's all I have to go on, since the mafia was all mafia at the beginning too, and clearly, recent posts aren't enough to give us the info we need.

So this exchange struck me, casting some suspicion on Queuing and Aguecheek: it was Queuing that first FOS'd sturmhauke for surviving the night (in post 304 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8405976&postcount=304)) and Aguecheek picked it up in 393 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8405976&postcount=393). We are now confident that sturm is town, so I consider Ag and Q equally suspicious now. but I am early in my reread so I am not prepared to vote for them. I'm only posting this now so I can get it in before the deadline.

The problem is, I keep having to choose between voting for people I think are scum (suspects I have listed before) and people who the town thinks are scum. Aguecheek was about to get lynched yesterday and I never figured out why. I'm not convinced of the logic against him today, and as Pygmy Rugger just pointed out that my reasoning is faulty, I'm not going to vote for him.

So I'm going to stick with my principles and vote for the ones I truly feel to be scummy. lynch Pygmy Rugger

[storyteller0910]

I am still looking for reasons to be convinced about Aguecheek.

For some reason folks don't like my bringing up very old posts as evidence. Frankly it's all I have to go on, since the mafia was all mafia at the beginning too, and clearly, recent posts aren't enough to give us the info we need.

So this exchange struck me, casting some suspicion on Queuing and Aguecheek: it was Queuing that first FOS'd sturmhauke for surviving the night (in post 304 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8405976&postcount=304)) and Aguecheek picked it up in 393 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8405976&postcount=393). We are now confident that sturm is town, so I consider Ag and Q equally suspicious now. but I am early in my reread so I am not prepared to vote for them. I'm only posting this now so I can get it in before the deadline.

The problem is, I keep having to choose between voting for people I think are scum (suspects I have listed before) and people who the town thinks are scum. Aguecheek was about to get lynched yesterday and I never figured out why. I'm not convinced of the logic against him today, and as Pygmy Rugger just pointed out that my reasoning is faulty, I'm not going to vote for him.

So I'm going to stick with my principles and vote for the ones I truly feel to be scummy. lynch Pygmy Rugger

You know what? I agree.

unvote Aguecheek
vote Pygmy Rugger

[NAF1138]

Ok, better late than never.

3 1/2 hours to go.

6- Aguecheek - (Rysto, Kat, Fretful Porpentine, MonkeyMench, Queuing, StarvingButStrong)
4- Queuing - (brewha, Aguecheek, Pygmy Rugger, Sturmhauke)
2- Pygmy Rugger - (cowgirl, stroyteller)
1- brewha - (Lakai)
1- hocow - (Pleonast)


Also, I haven't seen a reason posted for why hocow has been so absent today. Did anyone else see it?

[Aguecheek]

Not much else I can say. I've made my defense.

I will state that we have to kill the Serial Killer. We've let him go on and on, killing indiscriminately, while we jump on everyone we believe may be mafia. We've been wrong for the most part, and we're down to the wire.

We need to kill the Serial Killer or no matter what else happens, we lose, the mafia loses, and it's one lone chucklehead out there that gets to rule the town.

[Pleonast]

hocow still hasn't voted? Very scummy. I'm not changing my vote.

And Queuing is looking scummy to me. Initially, when the Town vs Town arguments first became apparent and Q was involved, I think he got a free pass on being Town. And he's continued to participate at a high level, defying the lurking scum stereotype. But I think he is scum, with a perfect cover. If we don't lynch him today, then tomorrow.

[Pleonast]

Oh, one more comment: the Town should let the Mafia take care of the Serial Killer. The Town doesn't have the luxury anymore, the game is too close.

[cowgirl]

I feel terrible about the lack of attention I've been paying this game, but I have lots of time today (my sinuses are clear, my dog has healed, my job has returned to normal). I hope nobody minds if I keep posting things I notice during my reread (where I am collecting Kat's posts). Today is almost over but I want to get this stuff on the record in case anyone feels like thinking about it overnight. Also I want to make sure it's posted in case my life goes nuts again.

This is interesting: Fretful Porpentine listed the Enfant Terrible bandwagon in post 632 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8414695&postcount=632):

status added by me in bold

Pleonast (after first voting for Kivvik) Mason
BlasterMaster Vigilante
ArizonaTeach citizen
FlyingCow (after first voting for Autolycus) mafia
Gadarene citizen
Malacandra (after first voting for Autolycus) citizen
Storyteller0910 unknown
pimaspinner beat cop
Cowgirl v.1 citizen
Winston Smith citizenSo in that case at least, it was almost entirely town-driven.

What can we learn from this? Well, in part, that the mafia were laughing their arses off at us, and with good reason. Also note that Fretful Porpentine and Lakai both reproduced this list to draw attention to the voters. Perhaps they were doing so innocently, and perhaps they were trying to whip up another town-filled bandwagon against another townie.

[cowgirl]

MonkeyMensch was the first to point out that Menocchio was the detective's breadcrumb (post 587, shortly after daybreak) :

But CaerieD had a chance to investigate and live just one night. And she names only Menocchio as being trusted. I think that's a bread crumb if I've ever seen one.

That's what spurred Rysto's "Guys, CaerieD's death was no accident ..." analysis, but MM pointed it out first. The reason this makes me suspicious of MM is because this was far from established at that point but MM is quite decisive about it, before ANY analysis or discussion of it had taken place on this board. This says to me either that he was the very first to spot the crumb and make the conclusion, or else that he slipped up and referred to a conversation he had been having all night.

Yes, I know this is a very weak attempt at a FOS. But I'm grasping at straws here. We don't have much more than straw to go on.

[cowgirl]

nesta, known mafia, points out that Queuing didn't jump on the Blaster Master bandwagon, but rather that he started it (post 768 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8416656&postcount=768)). This diminishes my suspicion of Queuing as it looks like nesta is feeding the bandwagon against both he and Blaster Master.

[Rysto]

That's what spurred Rysto's "Guys, CaerieD's death was no accident ..." analysis, but MM pointed it out first. The reason this makes me suspicious of MM is because this was far from established at that point but MM is quite decisive about it, before ANY analysis or discussion of it had taken place on this board. This says to me either that he was the very first to spot the crumb and make the conclusion, or else that he slipped up and referred to a conversation he had been having all night.
Yeah, but that analysis FoS'ed Pleonast, Master Blaster, MadTheSwine, Gadarene and chrisk, all of whom have been confirmed Town. Given that my analysis was obviously completely wrong, I don't think that it's likely that the Mafia picked up on CaerieD's breadcrumb.

[cowgirl]

Yeah, but that analysis FoS'ed Pleonast, Master Blaster, MadTheSwine, Gadarene and chrisk, all of whom have been confirmed Town. Given that my analysis was obviously completely wrong, I don't think that it's likely that the Mafia picked up on CaerieD's breadcrumb.really? So you reckon it was just a lucky hit? I'm not so sure. I think the mafia were smart enough to see it.

It's actually kind of sad to look over the first few days: most of the most active posters (and most common recipients of the old FOS) are dead now. That means that most of the mafia were pretty quiet in the early days. If there's an easy way to see and compare how often people post during the various days/nights, I'd like to see it.

[MonkeyMensch]

... So you reckon it was just a lucky hit? I'm not so sure. I think the mafia were smart enough to see it. ...
Which hit are you referring to as lucky? CaerieD was hit by Blaster Master in error, if I recall correctly.

[Santo Rugger]

nesta, known mafia, points out that Queuing didn't jump on the Blaster Master bandwagon, but rather that he started it (post 768 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8416656&postcount=768)). This diminishes my suspicion of Queuing as it looks like nesta is feeding the bandwagon against both he and Blaster Master.

So you think scum wouldn't vote for each other, "in the hopes that it will demonstrate their innocence"? :dubious:

[cowgirl]

So you think scum wouldn't vote for each other, "in the hopes that it will demonstrate their innocence"? :dubious:er, no, how did you get that from what I posted?

Nesta (mafia) made sure to point out that Queuing (unknown) STARTED the bandwagon (against a known citizen); my concern is not that he is voting for Queuing but that he is trying to throw suspicion on him.

Which hit are you referring to as lucky? CaerieD was hit by Blaster Master in error, if I recall correctly. I was referring to the mafia hitting CaerieD. Do we know otherwise? if so I missed it and apologize for being misleading; can you point me to the post where it was established?

[cowgirl]

oh, also, can someone please clarify for me:

what happens this afternoon? Does the countdown begin or does the day end?

If the latter, I will post my (as yet incomplete) analysis of Kat in case I don't make it through the night.

[NAF1138]

oh, also, can someone please clarify for me:

what happens this afternoon? Does the countdown begin or does the day end?

If the latter, I will post my (as yet incomplete) analysis of Kat in case I don't make it through the night.

Day ends in a little over 2 hours

[Rysto]

I was referring to the mafia hitting CaerieD. Do we know otherwise? if so I missed it and apologize for being misleading; can you point me to the post where it was established?
When BM made his role claim, he admitted to killing CaerieD. Why? You wouldn't happen to know that the Mafia put a hit on her too, would you? That would certainly explain why there were only two deaths that night.

[Santo Rugger]

er, no, how did you get that from what I posted?

Nesta (mafia) made sure to point out that Queuing (unknown) STARTED the bandwagon (against a known citizen); my concern is not that he is voting for Queuing but that he is trying to throw suspicion on him.

I was referring to the mafia hitting CaerieD. Do we know otherwise? if so I missed it and apologize for being misleading; can you point me to the post where it was established?

IIRC, Blaster Master told us that after he was forced to Vig claim. I'm pretty sure it was in a four digit numbered post count, perhaps you should try looking there?

(;), it was sometime in the middle of day two)

[cowgirl]

When BM made his role claim, he admitted to killing CaerieD.

IIRC, Blaster Master told us that after he was forced to Vig claim. I'm pretty sure it was in a four digit numbered post count, perhaps you should try looking there?

(;), it was sometime in the middle of day two)groovy, I'll keep an eye out.

Consider my comments withdrawn.

[brewha]

Holy crap, 2 hrs! I thought we had until Wed!

6- Aguecheek - (Rysto, Kat, Fretful Porpentine, MonkeyMench, Queuing, StarvingButStrong)
4- Queuing - (brewha, Aguecheek, Pygmy Rugger, Sturmhauke)
2- Pygmy Rugger - (cowgirl, stroyteller)
1- brewha - (Lakai)
1- hocow - (Pleonast)

Here we have Aguecheek voting for Queuing and Queuing voting for Aguecheek. It really seems that they are on opposite sides. Or, one of them is the SK. If Aguecheek comes up town, we really have to string up Queuing tomorrow.

The way I see it. If Aguecheek comes up town, that means that Queuing is the SK or mafia. The mafia wants to kill the SK as badly as we do at this point. If Queuing lives through the night, he has to be mafia.

If Aguecheek comes up scum and Queuing lives through the night, I still think we should consider him a threat.

[Santo Rugger]

When BM made his role claim, he admitted to killing CaerieD. Why? You wouldn't happen to know that the Mafia put a hit on her too, would you? That would certainly explain why there were only two deaths that night.

Frak. Stupid early-morning meetings.

Claim time. I am the Doctor. Night one, chrisK protected himself. Night Two, Mad theSwine, and there was one less kill. Last night, I self-protected again, and there was one less kill. I think the mafia had an inkling that I was the doc, and tried to kill me. (I don't think they felt terribly threatened by my analysis.)

As much as I hate to defend cowgirl by posting this, it's post 2150. Some bolding mine.

[brewha]

If Aguecheek comes up scum and Queuing lives through the night, I still think we should consider him a threat.


I wanted to elaborate on this statement. Queuing voting for Aguecheek does not necesarily mean that he is innocent if Aguecheek comes up scum. At this point, if Aguecheek gets less votes, Queuing gets lynched. In the eyes of the mafia, it doesn't really matter which one of them gets lynched if the lynching of a mafia member seems inevitable.

I could speculate for pages, but I guess we have to wait and see what Aguecheek turns out to be before we formulate a plan for tomorrow.

[Queuing]

So no matter what brewha, I am scum? The way you think and accuse is still very amusing to me. Keep at it. You have a one track mind. How very nice for you.

However, as stated, I am not comfortable lynching aguecheek. He may be the cop. i don't think he is, but what the hell?

unvote aguecheek
lynch pygmy rugger

There is one other thing that I have noticed, but I have no idea what it means. The people who put a trust list on day 1 are as follows:

Chrisk Doctor---dead
Pleonast Mason
MTS citizen---dead
BM VIG---Dead
caerieD DET--- Dead
Zuma Mason ---Dead
Storyteller
Queuing
Gadarene citizen
Lakai
Pimaspinner Beat cop ---dead
Glee Citizen ----dead
Smitty
Fretful porpentine
FCOD Scum ---dead
Starvingbutstrong
Winston smith Citizen ---dead
Menecchio citizen -- dead


Seems like a large number of citizens did put down a trust list, while only 1 known scum did. Why is this? Did the scum not like the idea at all? Why wouldn't they have liked the idea? Could it be because it would lead to a lot of crumbs for citizend to follow when the inevitable happened? I don't know. I don't know if it means anything, but I am comfortable voting for people who didn't make a list.

FTR my scum list:

Monkey Mensch
Pygmy Rugger
Brewha
Hocow

[Rysto]

As much as I hate to defend cowgirl by posting this, it's post 2150. Some bolding mine.
JSexton didn't know whether his protection saved MadTheSwine or not, only who was protected and the fact that there was one less kill that night.

[cowgirl]

Seems like a large number of citizens did put down a trust list, while only 1 known scum did. Why is this? Honestly, I think it's because known scum didn't do much posting at all in the early days. They didn't vote for Enfant Terrible or for Blaster Master.

For the record the folks who voted for BM before his claim were

Town
pimaspinner
ArizonaTeach
Gadarene
Winston Smith

Unknown
Queuing
hocow
Pygmy Rugger
Augecheek
Lakai

[brewha]

So no matter what brewha, I am scum? The way you think and accuse is still very amusing to me. Keep at it. You have a one track mind. How very nice for you.

So glad you're amused. By your own accusations, I can't trust you now. You've already accused me of haphazardly jumping around with my convictions. I certainly can't change my mind now without upsetting you further.

If Aguecheek comes up town, then yes you are 100% scum in my mind. If he comes up SK or Mafia, you'll probably drop down to 80-90%.

[NAF1138]

I can't find evidence that hocow has posted anywhere on the boards for the last several days, so I won't replace her is she makes it in tonight and lets us know what happened.

Otherwise...dunno. If she can post twice in the next hour that would be for the best.

HOCOW! You don't have to post content, just make 2 posts.

[cowgirl]

Brewha, please indulge a poor girl whose brain is on mafia overload today; it is entirely possible that you laid this out six pages ago and I haven't properly absorbed it yet. What do you mean by If Aguecheek comes up town, then yes you [Queuing] are 100% scum in my mind? Why is that? Why your conviction that Queuing is likely scum, and that the revelation of Aguecheek's status will tell us something about it?

Earlier on you said Here we have Aguecheek voting for Queuing and Queuing voting for Aguecheek. It really seems that they are on opposite sides. Or, one of them is the SK. If Aguecheek comes up town, we really have to string up Queuing tomorrow. but that conclusion doesn't seem valid to me. It's probably because I've spent the morning reading Day 1 and Day 2 which were all, in retrospect, townies pointing at each other, with absolute certainty that the other was mafia. What other reason do you have to be so certain of this?

Thanks!

[Queuing]

So glad you're amused. By your own accusations, I can't trust you now. You've already accused me of haphazardly jumping around with my convictions. I certainly can't change my mind now without upsetting you further.

If Aguecheek comes up town, then yes you are 100% scum in my mind. If he comes up SK or Mafia, you'll probably drop down to 80-90%.

And this is why I will no longer bother answering your accusations. Your mind is made up, and no matter what I did you saw it as a scum tell. Don't trust me, vote for me, try to get yet another bandwagon started. I no longer give a shit about what you have to say about me.

[NAF1138]

Last call everybody

[hocow]

Gah! I'm here. Long night at work is all. I wanted to answer Kat's questions yesterday but was running late for work. I think I can do it in 20 min. Be right back.

[cowgirl]

Okay, my scum list is changing. Curse you Lakai and Pygmy Rugger, for completely confusing me. You have both done things quite suspicious and things quite helpful, so I'm going to have to wipe my slate clean of you and start again.

In the middle of the lynch-Queuing-direct-Blaster Master fiasco, I was struck by this post [my note added in parentheses]:

The town has been ripping themselves apart. I am town, I swear it. This is a disastrous outcome for the town. All 4-6 of us [Queuing, Pleonast, Gadarene, zuma, Blaster Master, Winston Smith?] have actually been on the same team, and just not trusting each other. The Mafia has been sitting back, enjoying the show, gaining more and more knowledge and power...If Option B, well we still go ahead with our plan. We lose 2 more townies from our hands and one more from the Mafia. This brings it to what? A 9 person hole? With 2 masons and the Detective dead? The town is in trouble. However that still leaves us with information. Instead of looking at who has said a lot, we look at who has said little to nothing. That list is not that short either.

Sturmhauke town
Fretful Porcupine unknown
StarvingbutStrong unknown
Smitty unknown to you [but town, I promise!]
Hocow unknown
Kivvik mafia
AguaCheek unknown
ArizonaTeach town

If we find out that it has been town ripping itself apart, you go after this people. In the morning I will reconstruct my suspicion list from that one.

[brewha]

Brewha What other reason do you have to be so certain of this?

Thanks!

I really hate to explain this since Queuing tends to get into a hissy when I accuse him. There are several things that build up to it, but basically he is overall the most outspoken poster that is still alive. The mafia should have taken him out by now. They haven't and there are only two possible reasons that they haven't. He is either mafia or has been wrong on his accusations and is helping them out.

Just go back and read our arguements during the past day. I really don't want to keep beating on this since Queuing is taking this game way too seriously.

[hocow]

Hey, hocow, what made you suspect Fretful?
-Someone other than Malacandra had thought hocow was the SK, but I can't find that post right now. Does anyone remember who it was?


Post 1922 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8439336&postcount=1922) is what seemed scummy to me at the time. This was actually pointed out in your analysis of her(I think?). The logic behind why she thought BM was the SK seemed faulty. More or less, why wouldn't the "real" VIG go after BM? There may have been something else but I'm pressed for time and that is one thing that didn't look right to me. YMMV

Also, BM is the other person who thought that I was the SK.

For what it's worth, I vote Aguecheek for many reasons already mentioned.

[storyteller0910]

They haven't and there are only two possible reasons that they haven't. He is either mafia or has been wrong on his accusations and is helping them out.


Look, I'm not sure what the point of continuing this discussion is anymore, but the fact is that you are wrong about this. There is a third alternative: that the Mafia sees no good reason to night kill Queuing because the town appears to be on the verge of lynching him just about every day.

This may not be the case, but it is a possibility. That you continue to ignore the existence of this third alternative is frankly dishonest discussion.

[cowgirl]

There are several things that build up to it, but basically he is overall the most outspoken poster that is still alive. Ah, okay. That is understandable.

I also find it strange that he was so nearly lynched, twice, during the Blaster Master fiasco, and managed to survive for no specific reason (except that they needed to stop the clock to decide on their vig-kill, and his posts seemed towny to everybody). But the first people to unvote him were mostly confirmed town.

There remain two kinds of players in this game: people who I am confident are town; and people who I am equally confident are town and scum. *sigh*

[brewha]

Look, I'm not sure what the point of continuing this discussion is anymore, but the fact is that you are wrong about this. There is a third alternative: that the Mafia sees no good reason to night kill Queuing because the town appears to be on the verge of lynching him just about every day.

This may not be the case, but it is a possibility. That you continue to ignore the existence of this third alternative is frankly dishonest discussion.

I didn't say it was the whole story. Frankly I don't see the point of continuing this discussion today either. I'll resume it tomorrow if I'm still alive. We all have less than a 1/5 chance of surviving the night at this point (if the SK is still going after town.) If I get taken out tonight, I hope you guys at least entertain my theories.

[cowgirl]

Kat's posts (sorry for the unconscionable delay ... I'm still working on it but wanted to get this in before nightfall)

My opinion FWIW: I think she's town. She's been helpful and her thinking always sounds quite reasonable to me. Of course, she wasn't one of the more active posters, and since I have concluded that the remaining mafia are (probably) not among the more active posters, I wouldn't say she is entirely clear of suspicion. Just mostly. Look for the rest of her posts tomorrow.

Day 1 starting p. 7 ...

358 - FOS Smitty for casting the third vote for Auto

362 - trusts Rysto, CaerieD and nesta; "jury's out" on Auto;

365 - inconsequential

Night 2

539 - supports 12-hour countdown

Day 2

595 - "In the original Werewolf thread, someone (damn, do I want to go look and see?) said that a shortened day is more beneficial to the wolves than the town;" "Since I didn't get to vote last time due to the timing, I'm going to paranoid-ly (is that a word) get an early vote in and vote for chrisk."

596 - clarifying above post

600 - jokes about Menocchio being Godfather

604 - troubled by sudden and complete change of trusted and mistrusted people? Why did Blaster Master go from trusted to untrusted and Menocchio the opposite? And what did Kivvik and Zuma do that made them untrusted? I don't remember them posting anything very objectionable. True, the later revisions are mostly adding mistrusted people, but the first list to the second is a complete turnaround. [lists what appears to be Queuing's list of Pleonast's trust lists] - this line of reasoning results in her suspicion of Blaster Master

630 - discussion of Queuing's suggestion of countdown period (point of favour) and request for experience (point of disfavour); reserving judgement for now.

- Clarifies suspicion of FCOD "cuz you've got DOOM in your name, of course.'

- Accuses Blaster Master of being sketchy with his trust lists

670 - doesn't think Auto is scum

671 - "Damn lousy coding. Grrrrr...."

678 - nacho request of my earlier incarnation

689 - clarifies that millers block people, not roles; unvotes chrisk

713 - vote Pleonast based on his pressing for trust lists

771 - says blaster Master deliberately lied in his own trust list

779 - accusing Blaster Master some more

829 - "If you don't have any other good Mafia suspicions, vote for the disruptive/unhelpful players..." provides (what I consider to be) satisfactory reasoning

835 - Defends the above reasoning with Auto as an example, pointing out that she doesn't mean to imply that Auto is beng disruptive

837 - inconsequential

879 - inconsequential

893 - [in the context of a discussion about Pygmy Rugger saying that three posters said they'd be away when they said no such thing], points out Pygmy Rugger's activity thus far (day 1: no contribution; day 2: vote for chrisk/JSexton, drinking posts); asks for explanation

[Fretful Porpentine]

Here we have Aguecheek voting for Queuing and Queuing voting for Aguecheek. It really seems that they are on opposite sides. Or, one of them is the SK. If Aguecheek comes up town, we really have to string up Queuing tomorrow.

The way I see it. If Aguecheek comes up town, that means that Queuing is the SK or mafia. The mafia wants to kill the SK as badly as we do at this point. If Queuing lives through the night, he has to be mafia.
I don't buy this. Most of the "sides" that have been drawn up so far have been town vs. town. (For the record, I do think Aguecheek is scum, but it's perfectly possible for a townie to think this and be wrong.)

[Santo Rugger]

Glad to see you got all Kat's triple digit post counts laid out. ;)

[cowgirl]

Glad to see you got all Kat's triple digit post counts laid out. ;)To my credit, I've read up to 1446 and she hasn't posted again yet in Day 2. This thing is LONG.

[storyteller0910]

OK, I've refreshed this thing twenty times in the last two minutes. I'm dying here.

[NAF1138]

Cowgirl you will have to wait to finish that. Sorry to stop you mid analysis, but this round is over.


And, another day closes on the little port town of Doperville.

The gallows has become a regular fixture of town life these days, and most people wake up in the morning expecting to be wrongly lynched by the day’s end. Life has gotten rough for the town, mob rule is getting worse, and it seems as though there is no one who will be able to survive the insane Serial Killers attacks. But after much debate the town decided to put Aguecheek’s claim of cop to the test.

“SO WHAT!” they shouted. “If he is a cop he is awfully bad at his job, he only gets things right 50% of the time!”

Some fought back and said that a bad cop was better than no cop, but this minority viewpoint lost out, and Aguecheek walked to the gallows with his head held high, knowing he did his level best to help his team. He died with dignity and a smile on his face.

Aguecheek - mafia

Has been killed


48 hours for night votes.

See you all again in 2 days!

[Santo Rugger]

Sweet, score one for the good guys!

*runs out to buy new F5 button*

[brewha]

Thank OG!

I'm heading to the bar. First round's on me!

[cowgirl]

YEEHAW! Congratulations folks! This was all you, as I was never convinced of his scumminess. Good call. First round's on me.

[storyteller0910]

Thank OG!

I'm heading to the bar. First round's on me!

Shit, at this point, I'll drink with you.

Maybe a bit of good news'll calm us all down a little.

[cowgirl]

First round's on me!oh yeah? Wanna fight?

[MonkeyMensch]

Yeah Baby!

Patient discourse, a little public reasoning and a newly taller Mafioso!

I'm off to the pub to feel, well, something other than benighted...

[Aguecheek]

Can I keep the badge? Huh? How 'bout the nightstick?

Guys?

Ah well, two nights of dead townies rather than dead Mafia. I'm happy with that. To paraphrase others who've gone into that long dark night ahead of me:

"Bah! Go Scum!"

It's been a hoot, everyone. Thanks for the game.

[NAF1138]

Oh and deadfolk, the forbidden threads got moved from IMHO to MPSIMS. So if you are planning to pop on by that is where to look.

[brewha]

oh yeah? Wanna fight?
Hey, as long as the booze is flowing, I don't care who's buying.

[Rysto]

Hey, what do you know? My scumdar isn't completely useless after all.

I have to compliment Aguecheek on his role-claim, though. It had just enough truth in it to confuse the town, and made late enough in the Day to force us to make a poor choice.

[Pleonast]

Well played, Aguecheek!

Don't worry, we'll soon be sending some of your friends to play with in the great thread beyond.

[NAF1138]

Now that we are down to many fewer players, I was thinking about taking a day off of the day cycle. What do y'all think?

[Pleonast]

Now that we are down to many fewer players, I was thinking about taking a day off of the day cycle. What do y'all think?Fine by me.

[Rysto]

How about cutting down the length of the night? :D

Hurry up and kill somebody, Mafia!

[Queuing]

Well what to do you know. We actually got another one.

NAF, its fine by me. One less day of brewha throwing insults my way constantly doesn't sound bad to me.

[NAF1138]

Pimma just changed her name to Hockey Monkey, so when you look back at old posts her name is now Hockey Monkey.

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>
NAF, its fine by me. One less day of brewha throwing insults my way constantly doesn't sound bad to me.

Looks like somebody has a case of the Mondays.

I think NAF is scum for trying to artificially shorten the day. Last night, I FoSed him as the SK. I think I'm onto something here.

[Santo Rugger]

Pimma just changed her name to Hockey Monkey, so when you look back at old posts her name is now Hockey Monkey.

Goodness! It's a good thing she's not still in the game, it was confusing enough when cowgirl changed her name to smitty and back again!

NAF, I figured it was ok to edit at night.

[NAF1138]

Sure, go ahead and edit at night.

[Kat]

Woo-HA! I was right about someone!

Yeah, I've voted for Mafia before, but it was usually because several people smacked me in the face with those people's obvious Mafia-ness. This time, I was in on the ground floor.

[MonkeyMensch]

Woo-HA! I was right about someone!

Yeah, I've voted for Mafia before, but it was usually because several people smacked me in the face with those people's obvious Mafia-ness. This time, I was in on the ground floor.
And if the Don takes offense you'll be in the ground floor.

[StarvingButStrong]

Now that we are down to many fewer players, I was thinking about taking a day off of the day cycle. What do y'all think?

Sounds good. We don't seem to do much until the last twenty four hours, anyway.

But to be fair you have to trim the night proportionately. So that means they get....where's my calculator?....38 hrs and 24 minutes. Oh, let's be nice: they have a full 39 hours. :cool:

[Queuing]

<snip>
Looks like somebody has a case of the Mondays.
<snip>

No, just tired of having everything I say either being a "hissy fit", "pouting" or um unhinged or something I believe is what he called me.

[Kat]

Hey! It's night time! We're s'posed to be drinking here!

*shoves a drink into Queuing's hand*

[StarvingButStrong]

Hey! It's night time! We're s'posed to be drinking here!

*shoves a drink into Queuing's hand*


Exactly! Eat, drink and be merry, because tomorrow, oops, tonight we might be dead.

And if I'm dying, to hell with my diet. Barkeep! Are there any pastry shops in town that deliver? Cheesecake for everyone!

[Santo Rugger]

Mmmm, cheesecake! I'll take two!

[Kat]

Can I have the chocolate cheesecake, please? *drools quietly*

[StarvingButStrong]

Mmmm, cheesecake! I'll take two!

Here you go: one slice with cherries, one with mocha swirls.



Can I have the chocolate cheesecake, please? *drools quietly*

Absolutely. But do you want the plain chocolate one, the one with added chocolate chips, or the one topped with dark chocolate shavings?

(Of course I ordered three varieties of chocolate. Am I a fool?)

[Kat]

I don't suppose you have one with added chocolate chips and topped with dark chocolate shavings?

Kat <--- chocoholic

[Pleonast]

Fools! Why dilute your chocolate with cheese or cake or whatnot? Gimme some pure semisweet Ghirardelli.

[MonkeyMensch]

Here you go: one slice with cherries, one with mocha swirls...

... But do you want the plain chocolate one, the one with added chocolate chips, or the one topped with dark chocolate shavings?

(Of course I ordered three varieties of chocolate. Am I a fool?)

You kip on yoosin dat word "Starving" but I doonah thing it mins what you thing it mins.

[NAF1138]

The sun comes up once again on the once sleepy town of Doperville. With a serial killer still on the loose and the mafia with their backs against the wall the town is even less safe than before. The number of innocents are diminishinng rappidly, but is the town onto a path that will save them? Only time will tell.

Smitty and Sturmhauke had become fast friends over the time period since Smitty had decided to have a sex change and become the woman he always knew he was. He took the name cowgirl in order to honor the memory of his dearly departed towny friend, and Sturmhauke respected that. They spent many long hours drinking quietly in the pub, Sturmhauke talking about the burden of being one of the last masons, cowgirl discussing how difficult being given the guardians gift could be.

Sturmhauke made the new cowgirl promise that if things got rough, she not waste her amazing gift on him. He was willing to die for the chance to save the town and there were others who needed her protection more.

Sadly on this night, they both would need her protection, but these selfless individuals would not receive it.

Sturmhauke was found shot through the eye (Doc Santoro style) in the middle of the street just blocks away from the pub. He must have been on his way home, but no one is sure. Inexplicably a hard bound copy of Shakespeare's classic play TWELFTH NIGHT was stuffed into his mouth post mortem. No one is quite sure what this is supposed to mean.

Cowgirl had a quiet death. Her drink had been poisoned while she was at the bar, and she died peacefully in her sleep, at home, in bed.


Sturmhauke - Mason

and

Cowgirl - Guardian Angel

are both dead.

This day will end in 96 hours on Saturday at 8:30 am pacific time.


Here is the current player list:
brewha
Fretful Porpentine
hocow
Kat
Lakai
MonkeyMensch
Pleonast
Pygmy Rugger
Queuing
Rysto
StarvingButStrong
Storyteller0910


With 12 alive it is 6 to start the clock.
Good luck and try to stay alive!

[Santo Rugger]

It looks like either the SK is on our side, and doubted cowgirl's role claim, or the Mafia knew she was telling the truth and didn't want to worry about her having a chance to block their kills anymore. If that's the case, the SK is very anti-town, for having gone after a known Mason.

I still find it suspicious that Queuing hasn't been targeted. However, the night players know this, so I think they might be letting the town take care of him. Like I said earlier, he may be talking alot since we think scum wouldn't be so prolific, though. I'm going to look through the past couple days of FoSs, to see who was fingered as the SK and how they reacted to it. If the SK is going after town, we need to find him soon.

[brewha]

Well what to do you know. We actually got another one.

NAF, its fine by me. One less day of brewha throwing insults my way constantly doesn't sound bad to me.


I didn't want to respond to this earlier because I believe it breaks the "no strategy at night" rule.

I do not constantly throw insults your way. I have not said anything that you have not provoked. You show me any post where I insulted you or used a scarcastic remark and I'll show you the earlier post that provoked it.

I'm not the one with a history of blowing up here. Way back on post 2802, Malacandra wrote

Queuing is right about one thing (on the stopped-clock principle, I guess): we might as well take your word for a Citizen read, and suggest you look elsewhere. Your chances of correctly spotting vanilla Mafia aren't as good, but the true positive/false positive ratio is well in our favour.

I didn't see anything out of line, but you responded with:

Thanks for the insult jackass.

How about you actually post something useful once? At least I am not afraid of throwing my ideas out there. Ideas to be tested, and seen if they are at all effective. You just post nothing but fluff and some lass insults. Oh wait, let us not forget your poor little manhood being insulted by some calling you a she.


Unless there was more to provoke that response, I believe it was out of line. That is the post you quoted before your response though.


So, why am I digging this up? I don't believe Queuing is a prick. I believe that his quick temper and resorts to insults are just his strategy to keep people from voting for him. He got me to second guess my vote and almost convinced me that my suspicions were out of line. We got plenty of time, I'm not going to cast my vote yet. I'm just wondering what others think of this line of reasoning.

[Rysto]

Every time that I think that I've found scum, this game throws a curveball at my. I was absolutely convinved that cowgirl was scum and was ready to lay out my case. Now I have to go back and read the bloody thread *again*. I'm at work right now, but I'll try to post tonight.

[Santo Rugger]

When Ague "investigated" Monkey Mench, he told us he came back town. I'm wondering if he did this because:

1. MM is Mafia, and Ague was trying to protect him.
(Not likely, since we were going to find out he was scum soon. He wouldn't be protected for long.)

2. Ague knew MM wasn't Mafia, but was trying to make us think he did option one.

<snip>I'm just wondering what others think of this line of reasoning.

I couldn't agree less. He keeps saying he's going to shut up, and he won't. Could be all part of that strategy.

OTOH, I think we need to start looking at some of the less prolific posters and voters. Let's get some ideas and arguments out there early today.

[MonkeyMensch]

When Ague "investigated" Monkey Mench, he told us he came back town. I'm wondering if he did this because:

1. MM is Mafia, and Ague was trying to protect him.
(Not likely, since we were going to find out he was scum soon. He wouldn't be protected for long.)

2. Ague knew MM wasn't Mafia, but was trying to make us think he did option one.

That was my concern in #3325 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8516317&postcount=3325) where he knew I was citizen and could bolster his cop claim if I died first.

[MonkeyMensch]

Grrrr, no edit.

And by extension the FOS falls on me if he's discovered first and the mafia therefore get some free suspicion.

[Queuing]

Siince I seem to get FOS'd for talking and not for talking, I will make this quick. I see no reason to change my vote from the previous day.

Lynch Pygmy Rugger

[cowgirl]

Bugger! Not again!

I feel like a pot of tulips in a Douglas Adams novel.

You guys can finish the rest of my cheesecake. You'll need the nourishment.

Go town!

[sturmhauke]

Inexplicably a hard bound copy of Shakespeare's classic play TWELFTH NIGHT was stuffed into his mouth post mortem. No one is quite sure what this is supposed to mean.
What does that mean? Guess I can figure it out in the afterlife.

Sorry for suspecting you cowgirl. Come on, let's go get some spirits. Ha, I kill me! Er, wait...

[Lakai]

That was my concern in #3325 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8516317&postcount=3325) where he knew I was citizen and could bolster his cop claim if I died first.

Sure this could be an honest mistake, but I like to think otherwise.

So for now, Vote MonkeyMensch.

Why on earth are mafia not going after the SK? Maybe they thought that cowgirl was the SK?

[storyteller0910]

Sure this could be an honest mistake, but I like to think otherwise.

So for now, Vote MonkeyMensch.

Why on earth are mafia not going after the SK? Maybe they thought that cowgirl was the SK?

Wait, did I miss something in re: MonkeyMensch? Maybe my brain is just scrambled, but this sequence of posts is not making any sense to me. Could someone clarify exactly what it all signifies, and why it equals suspicion of Monkey? Because I don't get it.

[MonkeyMensch]

Well sure.

Back in #3243 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8505913&postcount=3243) Aguecheek, then a putative beat cop, says he investigated me and came up town.

I had Aguecheek on my scum list and so in #3325 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8516317&postcount=3325) I said it felt like a set-up and voted Aguecheek. Part of that set-up was to throw suspicion my way if Aguecheek was exposed.

[storyteller0910]

Two more quick things, while I'm at it:

Siince I seem to get FOS'd for talking and not for talking, I will make this quick. I see no reason to change my vote from the previous day.

Lynch Pygmy Rugger

I am enthusiastically on board with this concept, for innumerable reasons.

vote Pygmy Rugger

Maybe this time someone will get behind it.

Also, and on an unrelated note, I think we have gotten away from really looking at the people who are night killed and thinking about why they were night killed. If the Mafia killed cowgirl and the SK killed sturmhauke, then it is confirmed that the SK is no longer aiming for scum. If vice versa, than anything is possible.

However, in either case, we had two living Masons going into last night. Either the Mafia or the SK made a decision to target sturmhauke instead of Pleonast. Why? It is possible that this was a random decision, but there might be information to be gleaned from it if it was not.

---------

I'm away in meetings from now until 4:00 or so, but I'll be back later tonight. I'm working on re-reading one more time, with a couple of new questions in mind, and will probably have a long-ish post the next time around.

[Santo Rugger]

Two more quick things, while I'm at it:



I am enthusiastically on board with this concept, for innumerable reasons.

vote Pygmy Rugger<snip>

Care to explain a finite ammount of them? All the FoS that have been cast haven't had any solid reasoning behind them. Will you and Queuing please explain your logic?

[storyteller0910]

Care to explain a finite ammount of them? All the FoS that have been cast haven't had any solid reasoning behind them. Will you and Queuing please explain your logic?

A detailed response will have to wait until later tonight, because I have to leave the computer in five minutes, but in brief:

You appear to me to be a highly opportunistic voter. You do not appear to pursue targets because you genuinely believe them to be scum, but because you can drum up justification for doing so. My final straw was when you made yourself the third voter on the Queuing bandwagon yesterday (?) - jumping into a debate that strongly resembled the townie/townie arguments that have dragged us down so far - which was something that I have in the past predicted scum would do.

[Santo Rugger]

A detailed response will have to wait until later tonight, because I have to leave the computer in five minutes, but in brief:

You appear to me to be a highly opportunistic voter. You do not appear to pursue targets because you genuinely believe them to be scum, but because you can drum up justification for doing so. My final straw was when you made yourself the third voter on the Queuing bandwagon yesterday (?) - jumping into a debate that strongly resembled the townie/townie arguments that have dragged us down so far - which was something that I have in the past predicted scum would do.

I think I'll wait until the detailed response. :rolleyes:

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>
Also, and on an unrelated note, I think we have gotten away from really looking at the people who are night killed and thinking about why they were night killed. If the Mafia killed cowgirl and the SK killed sturmhauke, then it is confirmed that the SK is no longer aiming for scum. If vice versa, than anything is possible.

However, in either case, we had two living Masons going into last night. Either the Mafia or the SK made a decision to target sturmhauke instead of Pleonast. Why? It is possible that this was a random decision, but there might be information to be gleaned from it if it was not.

<snip>

Here's what sturmhauke posted yesterday, and this is his spreadsheet. (http://home.comcast.net/~sturmhauke/mafia.xls) It's pretty much up to date.

<snip>
What does this all mean? That’s the million-dollar question right now. Aguecheek and cowgirl are both somehow still alive despite being high-value targets, if they’re telling the truth. brewha apparently voted for Queuing in an effort to bump someone else up the polls, despite there being more likely candidates. Then he realized his tactical error and voted for Malacandra to clinch it. Meanwhile, Queuing has been practically shouting down all opposition.

Here’s what I think: They’re all scum of one sort or another. Queuing seems the most likely SK of the bunch, the rest are probably Mafia. Consider: brewha has cast exactly one vote for Aguecheek (day 5), and none for cowgirl (either version). Aguecheek and cowgirl have never voted for each other, or for brewha. Combine that with the iffy last-minute claims the past two days, both of which are directly responsible for townie deaths, and I think it makes a good case.

Maybe I’m flailing around in the dark, but frankly I’m getting tired of this game. It goes from utter chaos to sluggish summaries of posting histories, and not much in between. So screw it, I’ve laid out my reasons, and now I’m voting.

For today, vote Queuing. After that, I would strongly suggest we lynch Aguecheek, brewha, and cowgirl.

His last sentence is the most important. Of the four people he lists, Ague and cowgirl are dead. cowgirl was presumably killed by the Mafia. That makes me think that the SK killed sturm last night, because they didn't want him to continue pushing this line of thinking. brewha and Queuing should be looked at very closely, IMHO.

[Fretful Porpentine]

Inexplicably a hard bound copy of Shakespeare's classic play TWELFTH NIGHT was stuffed into his mouth post mortem. No one is quite sure what this is supposed to mean.
Oh dear, I'm suddenly not liking the fact that I'm the only Shakespearean-named player left alive.

:: wishes she had Autolycus for company ::

[Kat]

His last sentence is the most important. Of the four people he lists, Ague and cowgirl are dead. cowgirl was presumably killed by the Mafia. That makes me think that the SK killed sturm last night, because they didn't want him to continue pushing this line of thinking. brewha and Queuing should be looked at very closely, IMHO.

This makes hell of a lot of sense. Even if it wasn't the SK that killed sturmhauke, Mafia could have taken him out for the same reason.

Right now Queuing is much higher on my suspicion list than brewha is, based on what he posted last night. (I'd like to clarify for Queuing that I am not suspicious of him for posting, but for the actual content of the posts.)

[StarvingButStrong]

Sturmhauke - Mason

and

Cowgirl - Guardian Angel

are both dead.


Oh, dear. Farewell, may angels sing thee to....well, to the Forbidden thread, I guess. At least you died with cheesecake in your bellies.



This day will end in 96 hours on Saturday at 8:30 am pacific time.


Take note, you people who mostly don't post on weekends.


I started rereading all of Aguecheek's posts yesterday, and tonight I'll do the same for Cowgirl -- I suggest all townies should do the same. Hopefully something new will strike us, now that their orientation is known for sure.


So, 12 people. Likely 4 scum, 1 SK, 7 townies. :eek:

Working though the possible futures:

A) If we kill the SK today, tonight the Mafia kill a townie
-----------at dawn it would be: 4 scum 6 townies

B) If we kill a mafia today and
----- B1) the mafia kill the SK and
-------- B1a) the SK kills a mafia
----------- at dawn it would be: 2 scum 7 townies
-------- B1b) the SK kills a townie
----------- at dawn it would be: 3 scum 6 townies

----- B2) the mafia kill a townie and
-------- B2a) the SK kills a mafia
----------- at dawn it would be: 2 scum 1 sk 6 townies
-------- B2b) the SK kills a townie
-----------at dawn it would be: 3 scum 1 sk 5 townies


C) If we kill a townie today and
----- C1) the mafia kill the SK and
-------- C1a) the SK kills a mafia
----------- at dawn it would be: 3 scum 6 townies
-------- C1b) the SK killa a townie
----------- at dawn it would be: 4 scum 5 townies

----- C2) the mafia kill a townie and
-------- C2a) the SK kills a mafia
----------- at dawn it would be: 3 scum 1 sk 5 townies
-------- C2b) the SK kills a townie
----------- at dawn it would be: 4 scum 1 sk 4 townies


Of coures, the mafia can choose not to kill, and if the SK is alive at dusk, so could s/he, but...


The question is, which set of futures would be better for the town to aim for? A or B/C? I think it's clear that for chances of town winning B > A > C. But is A better or worse than B/C?


In a weird way, right now it seems like we are playing chicken with the mafia: we both need the SK to die eventually, OTOH, forcing the OTHER side to take out the SK is better for your side's chances. Which of us will swerve first?

But then, there's the asymmetry of the Mafia needing the SK dead before they become the majority, while Town only needs the SK dead before the last Mafia goes away....

:: sigh ::

It's too complicated for me. Can someone else say what's the best course for us to follow? Do we try to kill the SK or a Mafia?

[Santo Rugger]

This makes hell of a lot of sense. Even if it wasn't the SK that killed sturmhauke, Mafia could have taken him out for the same reason.

Right now Queuing is much higher on my suspicion list than brewha is, based on what he posted last night. (I'd like to clarify for Queuing that I am not suspicious of him for posting, but for the actual content of the posts.)

What did Queuing say last night, other than whining about brewha picking on him.

When I looked back at last night to find out, I remembered cowgirl didn't get any of Kat's posts in the quad digits. I'm slightly suspicious that her life was ended midway through her analysis. It would be stronger, but there's much greater reasons scum would have wanted her dead.

[Santo Rugger]

On second thought, it's not like somebody else couldn't pick it up where she left off.

SBS, what do you mean by "B/C"?

[Kat]

What did Queuing say last night, other than whining about brewha picking on him.

Wow. It wasn't last night. It was *counts days on her fingers* Saturday night. How did I lose two days? I wasn't drunk or anything.

It's a combination of the lurker-lynching sentiment and the abrupt decision to reverse his stance on believing role claims.

When I looked back at last night to find out, I remembered cowgirl didn't get any of Kat's posts in the quad digits. I'm slightly suspicious that her life was ended midway through her analysis. It would be stronger, but there's much greater reasons scum would have wanted her dead.

I'm kinda disappointed in that myself. I wanted to see my analysis. Someone else wanna do it?

[Kat]

Post 1922 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8439336&postcount=1922) is what seemed scummy to me at the time. This was actually pointed out in your analysis of her(I think?). The logic behind why she thought BM was the SK seemed faulty. More or less, why wouldn't the "real" VIG go after BM? There may have been something else but I'm pressed for time and that is one thing that didn't look right to me. YMMV

Yes, you are right. I did point out that elaborate conspiracy theory in my Fretful analysis here (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494224&postcount=3110). I didn't really see a point for Mafia to create such a bizarre theory, and so assumed she was just making the game more complicated than she needed to for herself, but I didn't have the SK in mind while I was looking her over. I was fixated on Mafia at the time. If she is SK, she's done a good job of avoiding the "play for herself" style that the other SK suspects have been fingered for.

[storyteller0910]

Ack, y'all, I really thought I had something. I still have something, but I don't know if it's very helpful. Here it is anyway, in case someone sees something I don't:

I was looking at the post counts for our little thread, just out of curiosity, and noticed that the third most prolific living poster, behind only Queuing and brewha, was Rysto. I found that odd because, as I've mentioned recently, my initial early impression of Rysto as very strong town had faded, leaving me with no impression at all. I couldn't really remember him being deeply involved in any of the major "events" of the game so far, couldn't remember much at all. So I figured I'd read the helpful post summary written about him, jog my memory.

There was no helpful post summary written about him. Why not? Well, one player was assigned to the task of analyzing Rysto, but "didn't see the assignment" and analyzed Queuing instead. That player?

Aguecheek.

Ah ha! I thought. Maybe this is a lead. Maybe Aguecheek balked at doing a summary / analysis of Rysto because he knew Rysto was Mafia, and that either: (1) Rysto's posts would give him away somehow; or (2) just the act of doing the analysis would cast suspicion on one of them if the other was revealed.

So I did the Rysto analysis myself. It follows. I have done this slightly differently than the others; first of all, I didn't link to each post, because frankly I forgot to do it until about halfway through and there is no way I'm going through the first 70 posts again. Also, I've listed posts together when they support the same idea. So here we go:

posts 2, 146, 540, 576, 609, 612, 750, 767, 850, 911, 1103, 1623, 1657, 1661, 1669, 1670, 1678, 1875, 1884, 1892, 1896, 1980, 1999, 2031, 2049, 2053, 2127, 2138, 2230, 2280, 2418, 2423, 2572, 2612, 2615, 2644, 2651, 2906, 2907, 2967, 2969, 2971, 3296, 3310, 3328, 3331, 3374, 3417, 3421, and 3442 - introductory, joke, night, or filler posts (also includes a few posts that are nominally game-related, but that I felt weren't substantial enough to warrant including below and clouding the results with a lot of noise).

post 251 - unsurprised that Mafia went after experienced players; speculates on the probable strategy of the SK (he thinks the SK should be playing on the side of the town, at least at this point)

post 256 - asks for someone to take over spreadsheet duty from dnooman

post 272 - random vote Gadarene

posts 281, 286, 300 - Explains and analyzes chrisk's Open Detection System, on the basis of the assumption that it will help the Mafia root out the real cops.

posts 308, 313, 397 - Defends sturmhauke against various people suggesting that sturm shouldn't have survived Night 1; speculates that dnooman was the Mafia's kill Night 1

posts 340, 344, 360, 366 - Talks about why analysis and lots of discussion are good things, and starts a spreadsheet. Feels that votes, rather than FoS-ing, are the key to generating useful analysis.

post 378 - asks for clarification on SK win conditions

post 385 - Describes how the beat cop might be useful.

posts 490, 543, 618, 705, 903, 1021, 2413, 3251 - Argues against rushing things - doesn't want to end the Day early (this was right before the lynching of Enfant Terrible). After ET's death, argues in favor of a 12-hour countdown period after a lynch majority is achieved. Later posts will show a similar interest in avoiding being in a hurry - agreeing with Zuma that we shouldn't place a 10th vote until we're happy with a target, unvoting chrisk to avoid a speed-lynch, wanting to wait to hear JSexton's contributions before proceeding with votes in Day 2,

post 579 - Does not think the Doctor should be protecting him-/herself.

posts 584, 585 - notes that only the Mafia and SK can choose not to kill; wonders why there were only 2 deaths Night 2. Speculates that maybe SK chose not to kill in order to avoid hurting the town by kiling randomly, but thinks the Doctor's protection is the most likely explanation, with the Miller another possibility.

posts 589, 591, 594, 717 - Comes out strongly against chrisk's ODS, suggests that it (the ODS was a trawl for power roles, which ended in the death of the detective, also suspicious that chrisk was against the cooldown period (in this group of posts, also urges FCoD not to make trust lists). Votes chrisk. In 717, encourages cops to find more subtle means of breadcrumbing than simple trust/mistrust lists.

posts 650, 766, 770 - Points FoS at Blaster Master, MadtheSwine, Pleonast. In 766, chastises BM for saying that the bandwagon against him was "indefensible," pointing to the fact that BM supported trust lists, led the ET bandwagon, and called for the death of CaerieD. At 770, is not voting but would be happy lynching Pleonast, BM, or chrisk.

post 690 - Wonders whether the Doctor protected Autolycus Night 2.

post 1086, 1095, 1108, 1125 - Proposes the "Use Blaster Master as a tool, telling him who to kill" plan that was eventually adopted by the town. Proposes an alternate plan involving BM receiving Doc protection until a "real" Vig counterclaimed, but then suggests flaws in this plan.

1417, 1465, 1562 - Says regarding Day 2 donnybrook "If the Mafia have any brains at all, they're on both sides." Repeats this assertion in 1465, then votes Gadarene, and to Vig kill Winston Smith. Eventually changes his mind about the Vig kill plan.

1465 - Urges Masons to counterclaim if Pleonast and Zuma are lying about being Masons.

1882 - In his longest post so far, he casts suspicion variously and a bit vaguely, with no particularly strong push in any one direction. Does not vote.

1883, 1939 - votes hocow; FoS on me (for not voting for pima when I FoS'ed her). Wants to Vig kill JSexton. At 1939 asks me for clarifcation regarding when I intended to vote for pima.

1885, 1888 - Notes that if hocow is the SK and she is lynched, we will lose Blaster Master's night kill. Eventually switches his earlier vote to solve this problem by lynching JSexton and Vig killing hocow. Editor's Note: I'm not sure I understood the benefit of this switch.

1931 - Discusses disadvantages of failing to lynch SK early.

1977, 1981, 2013 - Suggests another conditional lynch / Vig kill scenario, but does not amend vote. Shortly thereafter, does change his conditions, and I think I clearly missed something along the way here, because the vote he says he is changing from does not match the vote that I thought he had at this point, but that is almost certainly my error and should be ignored by the reader. At 2013, changes vote again, this time to Vig kill JSexton if FCoD is Mafia/Miller, or pima if FCoD is town.

2031 - Argues with Fern Forest, stating that "we are certain that FCoD is Mafia," which we technically weren't yet, but it was looking pretty obvious at that point. Wants to lynch FCoD immediately (FF seems to have been arguing that he should be let to live while we hunt other targets, or something like that). Returns to JSexton or hocow as Vig conditionals.

2049, 2055 - Likes the plan to test FCoD's Miller claim; doesn't have a lynch suggestion.

2190 - Doesn't believe JSexton's role claim, but goes with it anyway. He wants to vote for me, but decides to vote instead for Suburban Plankton.

2362, 2375 - Urges Masons to keep under the radar; reminds pima to reveal only pro-Town or pro-Scum status of her investigation targets, not their actual roles.

2368 - Notes that confirmed scum were starting the JSexton bandwagon. Editorial note: As this record shows, Rysto was pretty actively against chrisk/JSexton from the start. However, I'd say that he had clearly articulated reasons throughout and wasn't really bandwagoning in any meaningful sense.

2379, 2387, 2602 - Supports pima's reading of Fern Forest as SK, and suggests that it may imply that sturmhauke is the Godfather. Doesn't vote. Then abandons previous theorizing to vote for Autolycus after pima posts her big GF theory. Eventually unvotes and revotes Autolycus to slow the lynch and allow for discussion.

2702 - Changes tack; thinks prolific posters keep coming up town and lurkers need to be prompted to participate more.

2709 - Not sure whether he is still suspicious of me or not.

2872, 2878, 2881, 2890, 2896 - Clearly hates Aguecheek's role claim and questions him aggressively about it. However, at 2895 he votes to lynch MadtheSwine anyway, despite saying that he would vote Aguecheek if Aguecheek didn't describe his breadcrumbs by a certain deadline.

3247 - Calls attention to the fact that no one has done his analysis yet. Editorial Note: I was very deflated when I saw this. My whole point in starting this analysis was that I thought Aguecheek and Rysto were getting away with something, and here Rysto pointed it out himself. Anyway, still drawing attention toward Aguecheek.

3268 - Observes that the Mafia can buy time against a SK win by outing themselves one by one.

3271, 3273, 3276 - Light sparring with Queuing over Queuing's contention that vocal players have been targeted; ends by vaguely defending Queuing.

3280 - Incorrectly identifies the killing of FCoD as a lynch. Probably doesn't mean anything.

3309, 3321 - Thinks Queuing v. brewha looks like Day 2 all over again; votes Aguecheek and essentially leads the successful push to lynch him. Later responds to Aguecheek's defense, pretty effectively.

3311, 3381, 3388 - FoS cowgirl, no particularly elaborate reason given (he doesn't believe her claim, and doesn't know why Aguecheek didn't investigate her). At 3381, he tries to catch cowgirl in a mis-statement regarding the Night 2 death of CaerieD, and responds to Pygmy Rugger's very limited defense of cowgirl at 3388.

3377 - Thinks a last minute shift of lynch target would be a scummy act.

Analysis and conclusions to follow in another post.

[storyteller0910]

Now the hard part: what does all that tell us about Rysto?

Well, honestly, not as much as I'd hoped.

What we have here is a very cautious player. This is reflected in his philosophy - always trying to slow down rushes to judgment, preferring the Beat Cop and Masons to play carefully and reveal as little as possible - but also in his voting pattern. He has voted relatively infrequently. My list above shows several places where he points the FoS at someone, but opts not to vote at all or votes for someone else. Generally, the people he has voted for were people that had garnered some measure of suspicion already - he focused on chrisk/JSexton when everyone had already looked askance at chrisk, voted for Suburban Plankton when the vote was going his/her way. He was very skeptical of Aguecheek, but so were many. He has generally espoused safe opinions that are likely to be popular. This is not neccessarily nor even probably scummy in my mind; just cautious.

See, in the end, I don't see a lot of evidence that Rysto is Mafia. The thing is, he's been careful but consistent. He hasn't shown the voting opportunism that other Mafia have. When he develops a suspicion of someone, he follows it to its conclusion. His observations and strategic approaches have always been very pro-Town.

I guess it is possible that he is the Serial Killer. The way he has voted has kept him from developing a lot of enemies, as it were; if you always vote for someone that you know is suspicious to several others, you can hide in a crowd of other voters. Combine that with his tendency to promote safe, calm strategies and you have an ideal profile for a Serial Killer trying to avoid being noticed. There are a few bits and pieces of evidence that could support this idea, if you look at them funny:

- He developed the initial idea of the Town telling the Vig who to kill. If he is the SK, that would allow him to stay in control of his kills, reducing the risk that his kills would overlap with the Vig's.

- He leaped quickly to embrace the idea of hocow as SK, then did the same with Fern Forest; if Rysto is the SK, any line of thinking regarding the SK that points at someone other than Rysto would be a line of thinking he would support.

- He did describe our killing of FCoD as a lynch rather than a night kill, which might be the slip-up of someone used to avoiding the use of night kill terms for safety's sake and... oh, now I'm just reaching.

See, the thing is, Rysto could be the Serial Killer. But at this point, I'm pretty sure anyone could be the Serial Killer. Lt. Col. Markinson could be the Serial Killer for all I know. I don't really know of any way to figure it out.

So for the moment, having wasted my entire night on this analysis, I'm going to say: I don't think Rysto is Mafia and I think he has about the same odds of being the SK as anyone in town other than Pleonast. Which is pretty much where I was when I started all of this.

Pygmy Rugger next.

[Fretful Porpentine]

I'm wondering what, if anything, can be gleaned from Aguecheek's fake investigations.

On Day 5, when he made his initial cop claim, he claimed that his prior investigations and results were as follows:

Night 1 - Sturmhauke (Mafia)
Night 2 - Sturmhauke (Mason)
Night 3 - Blaster Master (Vigilante)
Night 4 - Pimaspinner (cop)
Night 5 - Queuing (SK)

I think the strategy behind the first four is straightforward: pick three people whose status the Town already knows, throw in one fake result for verisimilitude, but no more than one, to give the impression of being generally trustworthy. The fifth one is interesting; it seems that he wanted Queuing lynched, but was willing to back off when the idea seemed unpopular. On the following day he posted his supposed second investigation of Queuing:

Night 6 - Queuing (Town)

Subsequently, Aguecheek tried to argue that he got it right the first time and start another bandwagon against Queuing. I'm not sure whether he was genuinely under the impression that Queuing was the SK or simply saw a widely distrusted townie who would make a convenient lynch victim, but I don't think his behavior makes sense at all if Queuing is Mafia. (I believe that Queuing is town, because he seems much too vocal to be the SK.)

Night 7 - MonkeyMensch (Town)

Already discussed by a whole bunch of folks, and probably impossible to tell what it signifies -- but I'd like to point out that Aguecheek could well be pulling a double bluff here:
Originally Posted by Pygmy Rugger
When Ague "investigated" Monkey Mench, he told us he came back town. I'm wondering if he did this because:

1. MM is Mafia, and Ague was trying to protect him.
(Not likely, since we were going to find out he was scum soon. He wouldn't be protected for long.)

2. Ague knew MM wasn't Mafia, but was trying to make us think he did option one.
How about Option Three: Ague knew that MM WAS Mafia, but was trying to make us think he did Option Two?

[Kat]

How about doing me, storyteller? (At this rate, I may have to do myself...)

[StarvingButStrong]

On second thought, it's not like somebody else couldn't pick it up where she left off.

SBS, what do you mean by "B/C"?


I mean that if we aim to lynch a mafia (B) we are also at risk of getting a townie (c), instead.

On further thought, the other option should be A/C -- we may intend to kill the SK, but get a townie.

(Or, I suppose, we could try for someone as a Mafia and have them turn out to be the sk, or vice versa.)

Mainly I was thinking of the situation with Queuing. I think it's clear that Queuing is NOT mafia, given the determined efforts of a confirmed mafia to get him lynched. OTOH, a fair number of people seem to think Queuing might be the SK. So -- if we lynch Q, we may be killing the SK, but there's a really small chance that we'd be getting a mafia.

Suppose we think X is the SK, and Y is a mafia, and our suspicions are equally strong about both. Who would it be more advantageous to lynch today and who tomorrow?

[Santo Rugger]

How about doing me, storyteller? (At this rate, I may have to do myself...)

Umm, if he doesn't take you up on your gracious offer, can I watch? ;)

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>

How about Option Three: Ague knew that MM WAS Mafia, but was trying to make us think he did Option Two?

No, I'm pretty sure Option Four is the most likely scenario. ;)

But seriously, I get your point. I think we'll have to dig up a bit more evidence to make sure it wasn't Option Five. :(

[Santo Rugger]

<snip>
Suppose we think X is the SK, and Y is a mafia, and our suspicions are equally strong about both. Who would it be more advantageous to lynch today and who tomorrow?

Well, assuming that we get a bead on the SK and Mafia, I'd say it'd be advantageous to take out the SK. My reasoning being, it looks like the SK has been going after town lately. Also, as has been said before, lynching has accountability whereas night kills do not. If the SK were gone, we'd have control over 1/2 of the deaths, instead of 1/3.

Please excuse my horrible spelling, I'm going to bed now.

[MonkeyMensch]

No, I'm pretty sure Option Four is the most likely scenario. ;)

But seriously, I get your point. I think we'll have to dig up a bit more evidence to make sure it wasn't Option Five. :(
Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.

[Santo Rugger]

Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.

Umm, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

[Queuing]

The thread left the 1st page!

[Kat]

Umm, if he doesn't take you up on your gracious offer, can I watch? ;)
No.

[StarvingButStrong]

Wow. I suggested a few (real time) days back that people were losing interest in this game .... but THEN was nothing like NOW.

I think we simply started with too many people -- the game has take so long that all the tasks we 'put off' to find time to play have now become so urgent that they MUST be given priority over the game.

Still, we must soldier onward.

Right now I still feel that going after mafia is our best bet to win. So, even though I'm half-sold on the idea of Queuing being the SK, I'm going to

Vote Hocow.

[storyteller0910]

Wow. I suggested a few (real time) days back that people were losing interest in this game .... but THEN was nothing like NOW.

I think we simply started with too many people -- the game has take so long that all the tasks we 'put off' to find time to play have now become so urgent that they MUST be given priority over the game.

Still, we must soldier onward.

Right now I still feel that going after mafia is our best bet to win. So, even though I'm half-sold on the idea of Queuing being the SK, I'm going to

Vote Hocow.

Yeah, I know what you mean. It's a crypt in here. I mean, I did that crazy long and elaborate Rysto post 36 hours ago, and we've basically had no substantive discussion since. I'm still waiting to do my Pygmy Rugger post because I'm not really sure there's anyone even coming to read it.

What's happening, all? Are we out of gas?

[Fretful Porpentine]

Well, on the bright side, there aren't many places left for scum to hide.
Here is the current player list:
brewha
Fretful Porpentine
hocow
Kat
Lakai
MonkeyMensch
Pleonast
Pygmy Rugger
Queuing
Rysto
StarvingButStrong
Storyteller0910
So, twelve players, of whom one is the SK and up to four may be Mafia. We can eliminate Pleonast from consideration. Of the others:

brewha. I was supicious of him before, and am now more so; both Menoccio and sturmhauke FoSed him before they died.

Fretful Porpentine. I ain't voting for myself.

hocow. Has adopted a slip-under-the-radar persona; voting patterns resemble those of known Mafia. Somewhat suspicious of this one.

Kat. Unsure, but she seems helpful.

Lakai. pimaspinner identified Lakai as a citizen, and there's a more than 50% chance that this ID is correct. Shouldn't be eliminated from consideration, but not a good bet at the moment.

MonkeyMensch. Unsure, but Aguecheek's last-minute ID as a townie plus his earlier attempts to cast suspicion on MM suggest a genuine effort to get MM lynched, so I'm leaning town.

Pygmy Rugger. Unsure. Casts a lot of votes; known Mafia cast relatively few.

Queuing. Very vocal, votes a lot, seems to have a roughly equal mixture of wrongheaded and sensible theories. Aguecheek seems to have made a concerted effort to have him lynch. I think he's town.

Rysto. Unsure, but seems helpful.

StarvingButStrong. Unsure.

Storyteller0910. Unsure.

So, uh ... possibly not the most useful post, but I'm voting for brewha again unless I see any better choices.

[NAF1138]

We really will never make this the longest thread in SDMB history if we keep going like this. Come on guys, you are so close to finishing this thing!

Anyway here are the votes so far:

1 - brewha - (Fretful Porpentine)
1 - hocow - (StarvingButStrong)
1 - MonkeyMensch - (Lakai)
1 - Pygmy Rugger - (Queuing)

[storyteller0910]

We really will never make this the longest thread in SDMB history if we keep going like this. Come on guys, you are so close to finishing this thing!

Anyway here are the votes so far:

1 - brewha - (Fretful Porpentine)
1 - hocow - (StarvingButStrong)
1 - MonkeyMensch - (Lakai)
1 - Pygmy Rugger - (Queuing)

I gots a Pygmy Rugger vote in a little bit earlier, too.

[Pleonast]

Definitely run out of steam.

I'll go with sheer hunch and vote hocow.

[NAF1138]

2 - hocow - (StarvingButStrong, Pleonast)
2 - Pygmy Rugger - (Queuing, Storyteller)
1 - MonkeyMensch - (Lakai)
1 - brewha - (Fretful Porpentine)

[NAF1138]

Definitely run out of steam.


Well I can always shave another day off the day. We can end things tomorrow morning instead of Saturday. Try to keep the game bustling along.

[Queuing]

Yeah, I know what you mean. It's a crypt in here. I mean, I did that crazy long and elaborate Rysto post 36 hours ago, and we've basically had no substantive discussion since. I'm still waiting to do my Pygmy Rugger post because I'm not really sure there's anyone even coming to read it.

What's happening, all? Are we out of gas?


I did do Pygmy Rugger already you know :). Here is the posting history I did of him, Pygmy Rugger (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494529&postcount=3111) . It might make your life a little easier.

Here is the post where I recounted all the posting histories done up to that time. Recap (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=8496424#post8496424)

FWIW, I am not buying MM as town. I think Aguecheek may have thrown 1 mafia in his list. There were 3 unknowns that he claimed to have investigated. MM who came up town, Lakai who came up town and me who came up SK/Town. He, along with Brewha, went after me pretty damn hard. I think that at least suggests that I am at the very least not Mafia. He just sort of threw the Lakai investigation out there, and I don't recall any great leaping to the defense of MM as suggested by Fretful. I will leave my vote as it is, but I would like to see MM hang next.

[storyteller0910]

I did do Pygmy Rugger already you know :). Here is the posting history I did of him, Pygmy Rugger (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494529&postcount=3111) . It might make your life a little easier.

Here is the post where I recounted all the posting histories done up to that time. Recap (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=8496424#post8496424)


Hey, look at that. <sigh of relief> OK, Pygmy analysis coming up.


FWIW, I am not buying MM as town. I think Aguecheek may have thrown 1 mafia in his list. There were 3 unknowns that he claimed to have investigated. MM who came up town, Lakai who came up town and me who came up SK/Town. He, along with Brewha, went after me pretty damn hard. I think that at least suggests that I am at the very least not Mafia. He just sort of threw the Lakai investigation out there, and I don't recall any great leaping to the defense of MM as suggested by Fretful. I will leave my vote as it is, but I would like to see MM hang next.

I have absolutely no read on MonkeyMensch. Lakai has voted for him, citing some sort of slip-up-that-might-have-been-a-mistake-but-Lakai-thinks-not, but I don't understand exactly what it was and Lakai has not returned to clarify. On the subject of Lakai, though, and unless I am much mistaken, the Town reading we have came from the real cop, poster formerly known as pima, and not from Aguecheek.

BTW - I would be in favor of shortening the day some more, but only if we stand a good chance of getting the absent posters in here by then. As it stands right now, I think half the town would get modkilled for nonparticipation if the day ended.

[Santo Rugger]

I will most likely vote for either hocow, Queuing, or brewha, and here's why:

hocow: has contributed very little. This makes me think she's scum, of some sort, trying to lay low. Perfect SK candidate.

Queuing, brewha: I think their "argument" may have been precontrived. Queuing even went so far as to carry it into the night (twice, IIRC, the second time being when I was teasing him). All the major two-player discussions in the past have been two townsfolk. The Mafia knew this, and may have agreed to stage an argument the night before. Risky? Yes. The payoff? Huge. Alternately, one of them may be the SK. If this is the case, I'd bet the other's town.


<snip>the game has take so long that all the tasks we 'put off' to find time to play have now become so urgent that they MUST be given priority over the game.<snip>

Yeah, that, and it's finals week. :(

[StarvingButStrong]

Well I can always shave another day off the day. We can end things tomorrow morning instead of Saturday. Try to keep the game bustling along.


How about Friday evening instead? That would give the leading nominees a fairer chance to make a final appeal when the rest of us might read and think about it.

[NAF1138]

BTW - I would be in favor of shortening the day some more, but only if we stand a good chance of getting the absent posters in here by then. As it stands right now, I think half the town would get modkilled for nonparticipation if the day ended.

SBS's suggestion of Friday evening might be fair?

[NAF1138]

You know what, screw it.


I am taking 12 hours off the day. It will now end on Friday at 8:30 pm pacific. That is 35 1/2 hours from now!

[Queuing]

I have absolutely no read on MonkeyMensch. Lakai has voted for him, citing some sort of slip-up-that-might-have-been-a-mistake-but-Lakai-thinks-not, but I don't understand exactly what it was and Lakai has not returned to clarify. On the subject of Lakai, though, and unless I am much mistaken, the Town reading we have came from the real cop, poster formerly known as pima, and not from Aguecheek.

Oh you could be right. I was just working off of memory.

Re: MM. I did his posting history analysis. It will be linked in the recap post. When doing it I came to the conclusion that he was scum. I tried a couple of times to get him lynched but was unable to. Then the reading from the cop came, and I stopped trying to because I choose to believe all cop readings (with the exception of Aguecheek's reading of me being SK, as I know what I am). We all know that it was a lie. Therefore my suspicions are back. I posted why I thought he was scum in my posting analysis of him, which can be found by following a few easy links.

[Santo Rugger]

Oh you could be right. I was just working off of memory.

Re: MM. I did his posting history analysis. It will be linked in the recap post. When doing it I came to the conclusion that he was scum. I tried a couple of times to get him lynched but was unable to. Then the reading from the cop came, and I stopped trying to because I choose to believe all cop readings (with the exception of Aguecheek's reading of me being SK, as I know what I am). We all know that it was a lie. Therefore my suspicions are back. I posted why I thought he was scum in my posting analysis of him, which can be found by following a few easy links.

For the first time in awhile, I agree with you on this one. Mostly because of my "dizzying intelect" (not the fact that he said that, but because it very well have been a scum cover). I'm not completely convinced, but he's in my second tier.

[storyteller0910]

For the first time in awhile, I agree with you on this one. Mostly because of my "dizzying intelect" (not the fact that he said that, but because it very well have been a scum cover).

I think he was just making a little joke. You and StarvingbutStrong had a little back and forth going, with a lot of if we do this and they do that and we do this, and it was another "Goblet in Front of You / Goblet in Front of Me" thing. "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect," is the line Westley gives to Vizzini in the middle of that goblet scene.

Well, I chuckled, anyway.

[Santo Rugger]

I think he was just making a little joke. You and StarvingbutStrong had a little back and forth going, with a lot of if we do this and they do that and we do this, and it was another "Goblet in Front of You / Goblet in Front of Me" thing. "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect," is the line Westley gives to Vizzini in the middle of that goblet scene.

Well, I chuckled, anyway.

I chuckled, too. :D

What I meant in my previous post was referring not to the fact that he said I had a dizzying intellect, but to what 1/2 of the intellect "discovered". Since it's only 1/2, that doesn't put him on my top 3, so he's in the second tier.

[storyteller0910]

All right, let's do this Pygmy Rugger thing.

I'm not going to do the post by post thing, which was already done by Queuing, if someone wants to comb through it, here (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8494529&postcount=3111).

Here's how I see Pygmy's participation playing out so far:

Early on he FoS'ed and then voted for chrisk, which was not a particularly unpopular opinion at the time. Certainly wasn't baseless. Then, once word came down that JSexton was coming to replace chrisk and the buzz started to lean in the direction of "let's let JSexton get here and get settled in and give him a chance to talk before we lynch him," he promptly unvoted chrisk.

OK. Nothing so bad, so far. Then, a bit later, Queuing outlines his reaons for suspecting Blaster Master. Almost immediately, Pygmy Rugger votes for BM, saying that he had been suspecting BM but, "I was waiting for a convincing, logical reason why." Hm.

After the role claim, unvoted BM with the crowd. He waited until the wind was blowing toward Pleonast to vote in that direction, but once the crowd started moving toward Pleonast so did Pygmy.

At post #1244, he does something I really don't understand. Queuing has been talking about who Blaster Master should kill after he (Queuing is lynched, and Zuma has said, "Let's just get you to 10 votes and then talk about who BM should kill." Pygmy posts, saying only, "Wow." Then he votes for Queuing, essentially doing what zuma has asked him to do. But he also votes to vig kill zuma, implying that he thinks that her statement - calling for more votes on Queuing - was scummy. Looks to me like zuma gave Pygmy "permission," in essence, to vote for Queuing, and a reason to vote for her, and he took the opportunity to do both.

Later in that Day, Blaster Master makes a request that someone change their vote to Gadarene, to get the countdown started. Pygmy leaps in and does this (with disclaimers that he doesn't want to).

The next day, I made my earth-shatteringly poor analysis of pima's behavior, pointing out what I saw as a contradiction. Lakai then came along, agreeing with me and voting for pima. Soon after, here comes Pygmy, making essentially the same observation as I and Lakai have already made.

He later waits to vote for Autolycus until just about everyone else is already on the bandwagon, finally joining once he'd have the whole town for company.

At 2806 he jumps out on his own - a standout data point for its rarity - and casts an FoS at cowgirl, but does not vote. It is only after Lakai seconds this suspicion that Pygmy votes for cowgirl, saying "I think Lakai is right, you're just trying to find a bandwagon you can ride" (2831).

Now I may have nothing here, but this is the very definition of opportunistic voting. Pygmy has played throughout the game according to the line he used on Queuing regarding the vote for Blaster Master: "I was waiting for a convincing, logical reason why." He lets someone else provide the reasoning or the excuse, then jumps in with his vote so he's never out on a limb:

Queuing for the BM vote
Zuma for the Queuing vote
Blaster Master for the Gadarene vote
Lakai and Me for the pimaspinner vote
Lakai for the cowgirl vote

That's his pattern, and it reads kind of scummy to me. Now, he was one of the first to oppose Aguecheek's role claim, I think, which is a point in his favor. But in light of the above, I am very comfortable voting for him.

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However...

I also took some time and read Queuing's analysis of MonkeyMensch, and was surprised to find that I quite agree with Queuing. It's by and large not what he's said - it's the fact that he's said very little. There's no there there. MonkeyMensch has kept a profile so low he can barely be seen. In his initial rebuttal to Queuing's accusatory analysis, he claimed he was starting to get reads on one or three players - where are they? Since then he has said almost literally nothing. His only contributions have been to cast doubt on Aguecheek (and vote for him), and that chiefly because Aguecheek had draw attention to Monkey by posting suspicion of him. His other contributions have been pre-emptive strikes against any reasoning linking him with Aguecheek, jokes, and general friendly posts.

This is a player who doesn't want to be noticed, folks. Not at all, not even a little bit.

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So. I'm going to

unvote Pygmy Rugger for the moment.

I believe that of Pygmy Rugger and MonkeyMensch, at least one is scum. Possibly both. I'd like to hear their responses to these things; I will vote for one or the other by the end of the business day tomorrow, but I'd rather approach them equally for now.

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And now, I shut up for a little while, and let other people talk.

[brewha]

Like I said earler, my biggest suspicions are with Queuing, Lakai and Pygmy Rugger - in that order. But, the only possible way my suspicions can be correct is if Queuing is the Serial Killer. I'm not saying that is impossible, but he seems too loud to be a successful SK. Maybe he's hiding in plain sight, maybe he is just good at talking his way out of the noose. I don't know, but he is sliding away from mafia in my mind. But, I still think he is the most likely candidate for the SK. I would expect the mafia to be going after the SK as much as we are. So, with that in mind,

Vote Pygmy Rugger

[Santo Rugger]

Allow me to explain my votes and vote changes one situation at a time.

Concerning chrisk, in retrospect, knowing he was the Doctor, it made him wanting to do trust lists good from his vantage point. However, we didn't know he was the doctor, and since he had opposed them in the previous game, I placed my vote for him. When he quit, I still felt it was scummy, so didn't immediately remove my vote. However, once it became obvious we should at least give JSexton a chance, I removed my vote.

Concerning BM, I had said several times before casting my vote that I specifically did not want to simply jump on his bandwagon. I knew there was something peculiar about his posts, but couldn't finger it. Turns out it was because he was the Vig, so was acting different in a way that stood out. I held off my vote until I asked him several questions, and finally gave in when Queuing laid out the choices we had, in post 968 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8420365&postcount=968)

Concerning the Day Clusterfuck, that one basically boils down to two sides being drawn up. In hindsight, it seems silly that we did that at all. However, sides were determined, and I chose the side I thought displayed the most scummyness. I changed it a few times (and so did quite a few others, you're right), but we were trying to develop a consensus. It was pretty much agreed that taking out one person from each side via lynch and Vig was the best way to garner information. Since we were also testing BM's Vig claim, it seemed to me that if he were the Vig, and he took out an opposite side than the one we lynched, it didn't matter in what way the two "ringleaders" (didn't) wake up in the morning.

I voted for pima when she said something to the effect of "It didn't contradict itself in my head," which sounded to me like she slipped out of character.

I didn't vote for Auto right away because the only real thing we had on him was his mob talk, which I rather enjoyed. Also, I held my vote at first because I didn't want to start the clock, and later because there were already 20/24 votes for him, I didn't see the point.

Concerning cowgirl, I pointed the FoS but didn't vote because I wanted to see what others thought, first. I have rather trusted Lakai for most of the game, so when he voted where I planned on voting, I went ahead and placed my vote.

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

Although I may vote along with the crowd at certain points, I think that's just as valid of a strategy as going out on a limb by yourself. I've noticed you've (story) changed your vote because you said something to the effect of not wanting to be a Ralph Nadar supporter. Well, I don't want my vote to go to waste, either, especially if there are valid and logical arguments presented about a specific person.

[Santo Rugger]

Like I said earler, my biggest suspicions are with Queuing, Lakai and Pygmy Rugger - in that order. But, the only possible way my suspicions can be correct is if Queuing is the Serial Killer. I'm not saying that is impossible, but he seems too loud to be a successful SK. Maybe he's hiding in plain sight, maybe he is just good at talking his way out of the noose. I don't know, but he is sliding away from mafia in my mind. But, I still think he is the most likely candidate for the SK. I would expect the mafia to be going after the SK as much as we are. So, with that in mind,

Vote Pygmy Rugger

Voting for the person you're third most suspicious of? Seems like a little bit more of that "playing for yourself" strategy.

[hocow]

I had been suspicious of MonkeyMensch before. While looking for my original reason, I found this post. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8457654&postcount=2534) Maybe I missed the logic in this one, but why would we want Mafia protected?

Ok, I found where I started to wonder about MM. This (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=8435269#post8435269) will lead to one of his posts, which is a short exchange with Aguecheek who had called him out on inconsistency in his posts. Minor, but still. Further down the page in posts 1840 and 1841 is where I voice suspicion. I actually vote for him in post 1858.

However, Aguecheek was the one who caught the insonsistency, and their exchange wouldn't happen if they were both on the same team (at least I don't think so). Knowing Aguecheek was Mafia, I don't think MM would be. Unless he's the SK, who knows?

Bah, I am town by the way. I was one of the last people to vote for Aguecheek, so I think that would support the idea that I'm not mafia. Other than that, the only defense I have is my word that I am town.

[Rysto]

I had been suspicious of MonkeyMensch before. While looking for my original reason, I found this post. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=8457654&postcount=2534) Maybe I missed the logic in this one, but why would we want Mafia protected?
That applies if the SK was alive near the endgame. We would want the Mafia protected because if the last Mafioso was killed, we'd all lose.

[brewha]

Voting for the person you're third most suspicious of? Seems like a little bit more of that "playing for yourself" strategy.


There's probably four mafia left. I'm pretty sure that my top three are all scum (either mafia or SK). It doesn't matter which order they die.

Playing for myself? As you just said, voting for one of my other two suspects would be "voting for Ralph Nader". What the point in that? I'm pretty sure everyone already knows where I think Queuing's alliegence is. And I've already (unsuccessfully) lead a charge against Lakai.

We can only lynch one at a time. As long as the lynchee is on my list, I don't care which order we go.