Harry Potter Mafia

[Mahaloth]

Hey, everyone, this is going to be fantastic. I'm really looking forward to it. :)

:clears throat:

Welcome to Harry Potter Mafia(sometimes called werewolf). This game is set in the world of Harry Potter, but you do not need to be familiar with the books or movies to play.

This game designed for anyone to play. It is not targeted at veterans or newbies, so if you are interested, jump on in! A brief overview of the rules will follow in the following post.

Good news! I know many play from work, so I want to make sure that the town has plenty of weekday time to play. I may have to play a bit with a few Days/Nights to get us on a weekday oriented schedule, but we’ll get there eventually.

Anyway, here we go. Please, read the following introduction to get a basic understanding for the color of the game.

:story-telling mode:

Over a decade ago, the magic world was dealt a terrible blow and thrust into a horrible war that cost many lives. A wizard named Tom Marvolo Riddle rose up to power, using dark magic to build an army, control others, and kill all of those in his way.

He went by the evil moniker “Voldemort”. Over a few years, he built up a large army of followers, who were called “Death Eaters”. He and his Death Eaters came very near to controlling all the magic and non-magic world.

However, something stopped him. Stopped him and killed him.

A boy. A baby boy named Harry Potter.

Voldemort was trying to kill Harry Potter and after killing Harry’s Father, he tried to kill Harry, but Harry’s mother jumped in front of Voldemort’s wand and he killed her. Her love served as a protection for Harry Potter and cased a killing spell to backfire on Voldemort and kill him.

Except Voldemort had wisely planned for this moment. He had severed his soul into fragments, so that he could reform again.

And it looks like it has happened. Rumors from reliable sources have reported that Voldemort has returned to life and power and that he is rebuilding his army again.

From the same sources, the Order of the Phoenix has also learned that the Death Eaters themselves have infiltrated their order by using polyjuice potion, a potion that changes the form of the user and allows them to look like other people.

These are ominous and frightening times to be a wizard.

For indeed, Voldemort is back and is among the Order of the Phoenix. He wants revenge on those wizards that worked against him.

And he deeply, deeply wants revenge on that boy. That boy that stopped him. He wants to kill Harry Potter.

Sign-ups:

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

More info. in a moment.

[Mahaloth]

More specific “Mafia” game information:


Each Day, the players in the game will vote to lynch/kill one person. Whomever receives the most votes dies and is out of the game. If it is a tie….well, there is a plan in place for that, but I would not worry about it yet. Tie if you want to, but don’t whine about it if you don’t like what happens.

Vocabulary/Terms

1. One faction is called the “Order of the Phoenix” and is comprised of individuals who are working together to find Voldemort and his followers. “Order of the Phoenix” folks are this games version of “Townies.”

2. One faction is called, “Death Eaters” and is comprised of members who are committed to evil magic and serve Voldemort.. “Death Eaters” are this game’s version of Scum.

I will answer no questions about the existence/nonexistence of any additional factions, nor will I answer general questions about power roles and so forth.


Harry Potter Mafia Rules:

Votes are in bold and blue, like so:
Vote Mahaloth

Unvotes are in bold and red:
Unvote Mahaloth

Mod questions are in bold and green:

What happens if the lynch vote is a tie?

If I do not respond to your question, I either missed it(ask again), or I am ignoring it. If I choose to do so, I will tell you that I am not answering it, but I don’t “have to”, so to speak.

Do NOT PM each other about the game.

Nights are 2 days long, Days are 5 days long. They may get shorter as the player list shrinks. I’ll announce when Night Zero(an intro Night with no kills or power usage) begins after the signups are complete and we’ll go from there.


If you think a player has quit without telling us, please post in purple and I will either replace them or kill them.

Replace Mahaloth with Johnny Appleseed


All Order of the Phoenix strategy must occur during the Day. Because the OoP are so busy trying to protect their homes and loved ones, they do not meet out in public at Night and are unable to communicate in any effective way.

Only fluff posts are allowed during the Night. If you “talk strategy” during the Night, I will kill you…painfully(uh, yeah.)

Editing of posts is banned. Don’t do it. I’ll kill you if you do.

I hope you guys enjoy the game.

Good luck to everyone and have fun!

[Mahaloth]

OK, signup folks!

I owe four people a huge thanks. They helped me balance the game and came up with some great ideas.

Big time thanks to:

Oredigger

Jsexton

Natlaw

Peeker

Thanks, guys!

[Drain Bead]

in in in in in

finally a themed game with canon I know!

[Mahaloth]

You are signed up, Drain.

It's a fun canon to play with, I think. :)

[Mahaloth]

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Oh shit HP. I'm in.

[Mahaloth]

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

[ShadowFacts]

Hurm. Can't say I'm a big Harry Potter fan. In fact, you could say the exact opposite :smack: Nevertheless, it's just color, and I'm jonesing to play, so off we go!

[ShadowFacts]

NETA: I think I may be the only person in the entire Western world who has never read a HP book or seen a HP movie. :p

[Mahaloth]

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8. USCDiver
9. ShadowFacts
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

NETA: I think I may be the only person in the entire Western world who has never read a HP book or seen a HP movie. :p

Yeah, don't worry about the color. It's just magic and stuff. You don't need to know the movies or books.

[USCDiver]

But I haven't even taken my OWLs yet! I'm in.

[Trepa Mayfield]

I'm game.

[Rysto]

Damnit, I swore that I wouldn't play until the Malazan game was over but ...

/in

I cannot resist Harry Potter in any form.

[Mahaloth]

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8. USCDiver
9. ShadowFacts
10. Rysto
11. Pedescribe
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

[Inner Stickler]

/in

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Whoever's Snape, just so you know, I'm killing the shit out of you regardless.

[Mahaloth]

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8. USCDiver
9. ShadowFacts
10. Rysto
11. Pedescribe
12. Inner Stickler
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.

Sweet. 6 more to go and I can start getting this thing going.

[Freudian Slit]

Can't wait! I know little about Harry Potter but I know I love me some mafia! Can't wait to get this game started.

[Mahaloth]

Can't wait! I know little about Harry Potter but I know I love me some mafia! Can't wait to get this game started.

Cool. I'd just read the opening color in the opening post. That's all you really need to know. Oh, and the books are about magic and stuff. I guess that's it.

[Freudian Slit]

Cool. I'd just read the opening color in the opening post. That's all you really need to know. Oh, and the books are about magic and stuff. I guess that's it.

Yeah, I read the OP so I'd have some clue what was going on. I know about Harry and Ron and Hermione and Dobby the House Elf because he's just adorable. Oh, and Quidditch. And...that's about it. I guess that'll be enough. Thanks again for running this!

[Mahaloth]

I will be creating a unspoiled discussion thread on this board as well. I will try to name it very clearly so no one accidentally goes into it.

I'm thinking:

The Forbidden Forrest - Harry Potter Mafia Unspoiled Discussion


Anyone got anything better?

[BigT]

NETA: I think I may be the only person in the entire Western world who has never read a HP book or seen a HP movie. :p

Nope. I was suspicious of it while it was a fad, and then never really had a reason to read it later.

[Zeriel]

In! Although I will be slower than usual to post the first little while, until Malazan winds down.

[Mahaloth]

In! Although I will be slower than usual to post the first little while, until Malazan winds down.

Don't blame you. Being in Malazan delayed me from finishing this game preparation.

[MentalGuy]

I know I am going to regret being in 2 games at once, but

/in

[Meeko]

/in

[Meeko]

NETA:

It's not Haggle, but I think all involved will agree it has been enough time for EVERYONE who plays mafia on SDMB.

[One And Only Wanderers]

hurrah for pre /in ing!

[Chipacabra]

OK, no more cold feet, it's time I tried this game. I'm in!

[Stanislaus]

Hurm. Can't say I'm a big Harry Potter fan. In fact, you could say the exact opposite :smack:

Harry Potter's a big fan of you?

Lame jokes aside, IN! It's been a while.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

I think I just missed last place. If I'm not in, I'll be a willing sub!

[Stanislaus]

I will be creating a unspoiled discussion thread on this board as well. I will try to name it very clearly so no one accidentally goes into it.

I'm thinking:

The Forbidden Forrest - Harry Potter Mafia Unspoiled Discussion


Anyone got anything better?

Chamber of Secrets?

[storyteller0910]

Wow, that went fast. I'll join Guiri on the sub bench, if you'll have me.

[MHaye]

Actually, I think Storyteller is number 18.

So that leaves the sub's bench all for me. (I'm not sure I could cope with this, monitoring Malazan and a Mister Blockey special...)

[ColdPhoenix]

In!

[ShadowFacts]

I'm on the list twice for some reason, so I think that frees up a slot.

[Alka Seltzer]

Hope you have a good game. A Harry-flavoured game gives a lot of scope for some interesting role and abilities.

[special ed]

I go out drinking on a Thursday night and miss the sign-ups. (My softball team lost it's 9th game in a row. Next time, we go out drinking before the game.)

This looks like a fun game to watch though. I'll sub, if needed at any point.

[Little Plastic Ninja]

Ooh, I'd love to...

...er, are there any spots open? The list, it confuses me.

Never played Mafia but I can't resist me some Potter.

[Red Skeezix]

/in if there's room.
Apparently there's not. I go out of town for a couple of days and this is what I miss out on. ARG.

[Tom Scud]

Going to watch this one spoiled.

[Mahaloth]

I think we just filled up.

USCDiver had to withdraw and I did, indeed, have ShawdowFacts on the list twice(sneaky bastard trying to get two roles). :)

Here is the list.

Sign-ups:

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8. Chipacabra
9. MentalGuy
10. Rysto
11. Pedescribe
12. Inner Stickler
13. Zeriel
14. Meeko
15. amrussell
16. Guiri
17. Storyteller
18. Coldphoenix

[Mahaloth]

OK, folks.

I'm going to randomize the roles, then I will need a confirmation that you received your role PM.

IF YOU HAVE NOT ACTIVATED PM'S, PLEASE DO SO.


It's going to take me a little while to randomize the roles and so forth, but you will be receiving your role PM today.

After that, I will have a brief Night Zero so people can "settle in" and ask any questions they have.

So, wait a bit, and you should have your role PM.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

PM received!

[Freudian Slit]

I go out drinking on a Thursday night and miss the sign-ups. (My softball team lost it's 9th game in a row. Next time, we go out drinking before the game.)

This looks like a fun game to watch though. I'll sub, if needed at any point.

This is what you get for having a life outside of mafia! :)

PM received.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Have received my role owl.
My rowl.

[One And Only Wanderers]

confirming.

[Mahaloth]

Roles have been PMed out.

[peekercpa]

Hurm. Can't say I'm a big Harry Potter fan. In fact, you could say the exact opposite :smack: Nevertheless, it's just color, and I'm jonesing to play, so off we go!

crap the first game i help in looking at the set up and you come out of retirement.

bastard.

still appreciate the two man masonry cherry popping experience. i don't think i was incontinent back then.

[Rysto]

Confirmed.

[Zeriel]

Confirmed.

[ColdPhoenix]

Confirmed

[storyteller0910]

Confirmed. Now I have to resist the urge to start sending PMs and forming Clans.

[Mahaloth]

Confirmed. Now I have to resist the urge to start sending PMs and forming Clans.

Heh. No kidding.

[Inner Stickler]

Role confirmed.

[sachertorte]

Ack. Missed out!
Oh well. I'm going on vacation tomorrow anyway.

Well, it certainly seems like there is demand to play; just not demand to host. Either that or Harry Potter is just too darn cool.

Have fun everyone.

[Chipacabra]

Confirmed, and ready to go.

[Mahaloth]

We are about half-way confirmed here, folks.

[ShadowFacts]

crap the first game i help in looking at the set up and you come out of retirement.

bastard.

still appreciate the two man masonry cherry popping experience. i don't think i was incontinent back then.

Sorry, buddy. I'll PM you next time :)

[ShadowFacts]

Role confirminated.

[tiltawhirl]

*Casts Confirmus Charm*

[Meeko]

Oh right, a game with Wizards and Magic, right?

Meeko takes out his 300 card deck, and deals himself seven cards. Having won the cut, he chooses to play first.

Meeko looks at his hand and decides to play Tolarian Academy (http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=8883) and then 5 Zero casting cost Artifacts, then taps the Academy for 5 Blue mana. Using the 5 mana he then casts his seventh card, Battle of Wits (http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=83133).

Looks like I've got this game won before my next draw step.






Oh.




Yeah, ok Confirmed.

[Drain Bead]

Confirmo incantatus!

[Mahaloth]

Just a few more to go and I'll start a short Night Zero.

[Oredigger77]

Eeze I didn't even have a chance to tell you how cool I made the game and you're already starting I guess we're a little mafia starved over here. I want to say that I becamed pretty bummed once I found out the setup that I wouldn't get to play.

Any chance I can get in on the sub bench? ;)

[Mahaloth]

Any chance I can get in on the sub bench? ;)

Nah, but I'll give you a role.

You can be....the three headed dog from the first book.

:D

[Rysto]

Fluffy, IIRC.

[Mahaloth]

Fluffy, IIRC.

Perfect. Fluffy the fluff posting three headed dog.

[Oredigger77]

Done.

[Inner Stickler]

fluff fluff fluff
marshmallow fluff


Ooo, I want rice krispie treats! Anybody have suggestions for harry potteresque rice krispie treats?

[Mahaloth]

I wish I did, Inner. Those would be tasty!

Uh, still waiting a bit for some to confirm roles(nearly 24 hours on).

We will get into a brief Night Zero today, even if I have to replace those who haven't confirmed.

[Omi no Kami]

Hmm, it's been a really long time since I've played... any chance I could get on the sub list?

[Mahaloth]

Hmm, it's been a really long time since I've played... any chance I could get on the sub list?

Yes, consider yourself on it.

[Omi no Kami]

Hurray, grazie ^_^

(I wonder if Italian wizards make their incantations in old english?)

[Trepa Mayfield]

:waves:

[Mahaloth]

We still have unconfirmed players.

:(

[Mahaloth]

I'm going to wait a little more on our, as of yet, unconfirmed players. It is the weekend and some people may need more time to confirm.

So, holster your wands and wait a bit.

[Mahaloth]

And no dirty jokes about "holstering your wands". ;)

[Omi no Kami]

A few years ago somebody went through the first Harry Potter book and strategically replaced 'wand" with "wang": some of the results were truly hilarious.

[Oredigger77]

I'm confused is my job to fluff wands of the players? I'm not nearly as excited about being a fluffer in that sense. If I'm going to be keeping everyone's wands at the ready I think I at least need to be paid.

[Omi no Kami]

Personally, I polish my own wand- sometimes I do it more than once a day. :)

[Rysto]

A few years ago somebody went through the first Harry Potter book and strategically replaced 'wand" with "wang": some of the results were truly hilarious.

http://bash.org/?111338

Some of the last few quotes are actually from the later books.

[Omi no Kami]

http://bash.org/?111338

Some of the last few quotes are actually from the later books.

Oh, thanks for the cite! I'd forgotten about some of the later ones... I guess the trauma of the one where the Dursleys try to rape Harry was too traumatic. ^^

[Rysto]

I'd forgotten about some of the later ones...

The guy actually says that they're all from the first book. Presumably he didn't want to admit that he'd gone through all five books that had been published at that point to find the funny quotes.

[Omi no Kami]

Yea, even if he found a scanned/ebook edition and used used word search, they say "wand" like thrice every five sentences- it must have taken a lot of reading with a dirty mind to find all of the best quotes.

[BigT]

Since Night 0 has yet to be called, I'll respond:

Yea, even if he found a scanned/ebook edition and used used word search, they say "wand" like thrice every five sentences- it must have taken a lot of reading with a dirty mind to find all of the best quotes.

I think your the first person I've seen drop thrice into normal conversation. Don't you wish there were higher order words?

[Omi no Kami]

Since Night 0 has yet to be called, I'll respond:



I think your the first person I've seen drop thrice into normal conversation. Don't you wish there were higher order words?

Sometimes, but mainly I'm just impressed with myself if I can get a whole sentence out and have it be coherent. :D I've been traveling a lot recently, and haven't lived anywhere where English is spoken regularly for almost two years now, so I tend to get a little scrambled when it comes time to talk without tripping over my own diction. :)

[Little Plastic Ninja]

I would swear left right and center that there was some other word that meant "three times" that everyone else has forgotten. It wasn't thrice. It was something else. Damned if I know what.

[Omi no Kami]

Well "three times" tends to work 99% of the time-I just like the chance to play with language :)

[Little Plastic Ninja]

Sub-confirm!

[Mahaloth]

I'll make that official.

Little Plastic Ninja has replaced Snickers.

[Omi no Kami]

Sub confirm!

[Mahaloth]

And I'll make that official, as well.

Omi No Kami has replaced MentalGuy


Day One will begin shortly.

[Mahaloth]

And here we go, folks. Have fun!

With the news that the Death Eaters were among them, few could sleep during the Night.

A decision had been made. All wizards must make the best possible effort to find and kill any of the Death Eaters that could be within their midst.

And so, with that, a new Day began.

It is now Day One.

Day One will end at 12:00 Noon Eastern Time on Thursday, July 1.

[One And Only Wanderers]

What an awful performance that was from the English defence. I think they were being cursed by Death Eaters!

[Chipacabra]

Well, now we know that OAOW is a muggle. Which doesn't help at all. Hmmmmm.

[Rysto]

Right, now that we're off, I'm going to get on my soapbox for a minute. storyteller often makes the point that in these games, town players tend to be overly cautious about sharing the information that they have. I would agree, but only to a point. Town players definitely have a tendency to jealously hoard the information that comes with their Role. But in my experience, they combine that with a rather inexplicable need to share any and all information they get in other ways. A couple of examples from recent games I've played in come to mind:

In Crimson Glyph, whoever the doctor(me) protected got a notification that they "felt a layer of protection around them" or something similar. What drove me crazy in that game was that the people who I protected immediately posted that fact to the main thread. If they'd stayed quiet, any false doctor claim could have been outed because the false-claiming scum probably couldn't have guessed who had been protected, while the real doctor would have been able to name them all.

Now, as it happens I was a scum doctor and my power was basically a giant red herring for the town, but the point stands. Sharing that kind of information gave Town no benefit and holding it back could give the Town a great benefit.


In Cecil Pond, one of the masons went on a mass voting spree at one point before he'd claimed. About a Day after he did claim, one of the other town players commented that if the scum were to just eliminate all players that the known masons had voted for and all of the scum, they stood a very good chance of uncovering the last unclaimed mason. People jumped on him for saying that, and his defence was that all the information was out in the open and the scum had probably already worked it out. Now, I was scum in that game. It never occurred to any of us that we could do this(we were rather more worried about a non-existent cop, as it happens). The thing was, even if the scum had figured it out, town got no benefit from that fact being in the open. And sometimes, even if the conclusion seems obvious, the scum will miss it! They aren't perfect; they'll miss townie slips just as town players will miss scum slips.

So please, I'm asking all of you: if you are in possession of non-public information, think about whether it should be made public. What benefit is there to town to have that information in the open? What benefit is there to scum?

[Mahaloth]

One more quick sub.

Red Skeezix is replacing amrussell.

Play on! :)

[Chipacabra]

Just for the sake of convenience:

Can we get an updated player list, including subs?

Anyway, even after watching a bunch of games, I'm still not sure what the best course of action for day 1 is. So, uh... anyone want to declare as a death eater? That would make things way easier.

[Meeko]

Snip

So please, I'm asking all of you: if you are in possession of non-public information, think about whether it should be made public. What benefit is there to town to have that information in the open? What benefit is there to scum?


I understand the spirit of what you are saying with all of this (The entire post) I would even wager that you are referring to a few things I have done in other games.

However, I am not 100% convinced that town can have the advantage when they overestimate how quiet to be.

Isn't it always, by definition that Scum know each other, and have protected communication with each other? [[That is, town doesn't have access to the scum board. Scum can be open and free on their board.]]

From this, we find the benefit in having town post information in the open.

It would seem that the only REAL progress town can make in any game, comes when a town player posts, reveals, or claims non-public information.

Role claims seem to be common first or second day topics. I have heard about quite a few games that are won based on early claims. I have played in games where well timed claims, after the first or second day, helps town. I have not played in enough games to confirm this, but I would guess that a majority of games need a role claim to even set up a possible win for town.

What then can be said for the additional, non-public town held info, if the ""regular"" info so often causes town to win? Isn't there always the "equation" offered that if a Cop has >= 3 confirmations, that the cop should claim and reveal at that point?

Again, I understand what you are saying, but It gives me pause that you would say this. That you would say this so soon gives me an additional pause. The question of motivation comes up. I question the motivation here.

At the same time, there is no vote here.

At the same time, I am not arguing for a role claim or anything similar. Just posting my observation on your observations, extremely early in the game.

[Freudian Slit]

Good post, Rysto. I think we should def take that to heart.

I remember in the scum pond game getting a little flack for not having claimed, though, at the same time. It's always very confusing--should you share? Should you not? Tough decisions.

[Inner Stickler]

I agree as well that it's a good idea to think about the ramifications of posting information. Especially if it's not info garnered through your role. But I would say, don't sit on info just because you don't want to get yelled at by other players.

Chip, my experience with Day 1 is that we get a bitchton of posts from people talking about how they hate Day 1 and that's all they say, a banal discussion about the merits of role and name claiming along with strategy on lurker lynching that evolves into a heated argument to be followed by a slow growth of votes on a player who claims a town role at the Day end and everyone rushes to vote someone else. I exaggerate but that's about it.

[Mahaloth]

Can we get an updated player list, including subs?


Well, you didn't bold that, but I am a kind and good-hearted mod, so I will. :)

1. Freudian Slit
2. ShadowFacts
3. OneandOnly Wanders
4. Snickers REPLACED BY Little Plastic Ninja
5. tiltawhirl
6. Drain Bead
7. Jimmy Chitwood
8. Chipacabra
9. MentalGuy REPLACED BY Omi no Kami
10. Rysto
11. Pedescribe
12. Inner Stickler
13. Zeriel
14. Meeko
15. amrussell REPLACED BY Red Skeezix
16. Guiri
17. Storyteller
18. Coldphoenix


Please be aware, if anyone doesn't bold and blue/red your votes/unvotees, though, I will not count them.

[Omi no Kami]

I agree with the spirit of what Rysto has to say, but I think following any strategy to a fault can be dangerous. Regarding the disclosure of information, I've always personally felt that information about your role, or gleaned from your special abilities (e.g. a real mason hearing a false mason's claim) should be kept close to the chest until 1) You're in immediate danger of being lynched, 2) you think you've gleaned all you can about Scum with your info.

I know that #2 is where I get frustrated- real masons can watch fake masons to see if anyone is defending them or backing their claim up with unusual fervor, fake doctors and cops will sometimes have another Scum buddy come to their aid, or protect scum from the temporary trust they can earn until they've been debunked... that sort of thing.

I just get frustrated when a townsperson makes a great information coups/deductive leap and posts it immediately, without trying to milk the knowledge for all he can learn about the scum.

[Red Skeezix]

I know that #2 is where I get frustrated- real masons can watch fake masons to see if anyone is defending them or backing their claim up with unusual fervor, fake doctors and cops will sometimes have another Scum buddy come to their aid, or protect scum from the temporary trust they can earn until they've been debunked... that sort of thing.


I'm not sure where you've seen this, but IME once a scum player has been forced to false claim, it's usually the other scum who are scrutinizing the hardest, in order to earn the most possible credit for "outing" the impostor, and earning the bus credit the fastest.

RE: Rysto's comments. They're good laced with some real bad.

The good: Think about the implications of what you wish to discuss before you discuss it.

The bad: Don't point out things that are based on public information. This is horrible advice. As town, we should assume that our adversaries are playing at the top of their game and not hope that they are missing things out. The possibility of error does exist and we should not discount it in our efforts to determine what is going on, but it should NOT be a guiding principle, or weigh heavily into determining whether or not something which can be distilled from public knowledge should be revealed.

[Rysto]

The bad: Don't point out things that are based on public information.

What I said is, don't point out things based on public information if it won't help town to know those things.

[Omi no Kami]

I'm not sure where you've seen this, but IME once a scum player has been forced to false claim, it's usually the other scum who are scrutinizing the hardest, in order to earn the most possible credit for "outing" the impostor, and earning the bus credit the fastest.

Does that really happen? I would think that the hard-line people on both sides would be in some trouble: I've only played 2-3 games of mafia, but I would've guessed that the least suspicious people would be middle-of-the-road players: if you're too vocal scum can always find something in your posts that looks suspicious, and if you lurk you'll probably be called out for it, especially as the game goes on and the other players start realizing that they know nothing about you.

Given that, wouldn't it make the most sense for the players who discuss things avidly but tend to be hesitant to put themselves out on a limb to convince everyone else of their opinion to be the likeliest to be Town? It seems like giving your opinion and then letting the group make up their own minds is the best approach.

[Red Skeezix]

What I said is, don't point out things based on public information if it won't help town to know those things.

Yes, but how are you able to ascertain that it won't help town? More eyes on a problem can produce more answers and more discussion which leads to catching more scum.

To use your example from Cecil Pond, the player who pointed out the error, drew attention to that error. Another player who hadn't noticed that error was able to reverse the problem to generate some good leads, albeit on accident since scum wasn't moving in that direction. It is hard to know what will or won't be useful, so there isn't much use not discussing things which can be distilled from the discussion, especially given the possibility that scum may have already distilled them, and are discussing them.

[Inner Stickler]

The problem is that once you start discussing what makes someone likely to be town or scum, you're giving the scum a nice, handy dandy blueprint for avoiding scumtells and giving off townie vibes. The secret to divining a player's true alignment is in reading their posts and assessing their motivation for posting. Are they answering questions and trying to clear up misunderstandings? Are they talking in circles and clouding up the issues? Granted, you're rarely going to see a post that is clearly nothing but circumspection, but try to look beneath the surface of the post to find the reason it was said. This is why I hate lurking and as the game continues, I wil advocate for the lynching of people who only post 3-4 game related posts a Day. Talking is good. The more talking we have, the more scum slips up and we can catch them.

[Little Plastic Ninja]

This is all pretty interesting, at least from the perspective of a rank Mafia noob. Talking is bad! No, not talking is bad! The more you talk, the more you might give away! Then again, you could have made a perfectly safe comment and we could be hanging you for it!

So in other words, very much like a witch hunt. :)

[Drain Bead]

Welcome to Mafia. ;)

As one of the Masons involved in the previously-mentioned debacle, I agree that Town should always consider who would benefit most from the information if it's out there. I don't know how often scenarios like the ones mentioned will actually come up, but it's something to think about if you're a new player.

Another thing to know as a newbie is that in general, this group of players tends to lynch the loud. It may be best to ease your way in because of that, especially if you drew a power role of some sort. The fact that a loud player usually dies Day One is one of the more annoying tendencies of the games here. Just remember that quality =/= quantity. It may be best to have 4 or 5 quality posts a day instead of 10-15 poorly-thought-out four-liners.

[Trepa Mayfield]

So in other words, very much like a witch hunt. :)

There's a reason they call it "werewolf"! ;)

[Chipacabra]

Well, seeing as there's nothing better to go on just yet, let's aim the finger of suspicion where it may and see what shakes out.

Vote Shadowfacts

Just because we haven't heard from you yet.

I think I get what Rysto is saying. If you've got something to reveal, be certain why you're revealing it. Don't need to paranoid and supersecretive, just double check the value of what you're sharing.

[Inner Stickler]

Eh, Days are always slow over the weekend. I think a lot of players play during their work hours or on their lunchbreaks. I won't be concerned about the lack of posting until Monday this time. If we're not going gangbusters by then, I'll be very surprised.

[Trepa Mayfield]

Why is this in MPSIMS?

[Chipacabra]

Eh, Days are always slow over the weekend. I think a lot of players play during their work hours or on their lunchbreaks. I won't be concerned about the lack of posting until Monday this time. If we're not going gangbusters by then, I'll be very surprised.

Oh, I'm not actually concerned. It's a weak vote if that wasn't obvious. I just want SOMETHING out there to get things going as much as possible.

[Inner Stickler]

Why is this in MPSIMS?
Huh?

[ColdPhoenix]

What I said is, don't point out things based on public information if it won't help town to know those things.

Not sure about this. From my point of view (as a very bad Mafia player...), I think we should point out and analyse information already out in public. Some of us, like me, don't notice these things.

My reasoning is that town players are much more likely to have missed the info as each of them would then have to individually notice it themselves. If it's info that is useful to scum you can bet your bottom dollar that one of them will have spotted it and informed their colleagues via the scum board.

So not discussing this public information means that scum is generally better informed than town.

If info is already out then it should be talked about and analysed transparently. Secrecy only helps scum.

Whether or not a player should release information is a different matter entirely. They should think long and hard to make sure that it helps town more than scum before going public. Because once it's public that's it, there's no taking it back.

[ColdPhoenix]

Just remember that quality =/= quantity. It may be best to have 4 or 5 quality posts a day instead of 10-15 poorly-thought-out four-liners.

This I also agree with. I've been criticised in the past for my lack of posting due to only posting game related posts (often one long post after coming back to reading everything) and not filling the night with fluff.

I've no problem with people writing fluff and joking around :), just so long as participation (and lynching of lurkers!! :eek:) isn't measured purely on number of posts! ;)

[GuiriEnEspaña]

What I said is, don't point out things based on public information if it won't help town to know those things.
A minor nitpick: did you actually say that? (snipped and bolded)So please, I'm asking all of you: if you are in possession of non-public information, think about whether it should be made public. What benefit is there to town to have that information in the open? What benefit is there to scum?There's a difference between pointing out or analyzing information that is already public and sharing information which is non-public.

I fully agree that it's important to be sure that the benefit to Town is greater than the benefit to scum when deciding whether and/or when to disclose non-public information.

[One And Only Wanderers]

discussion of public material is de facto good and pro-town as mentioned by several people, it ensures that townies get full understanding of any revelations and minimises risk of a townie skimming over important info.

disucssion of non-public info can be good or bad and which applies is a case by case decision. Non masons with info that are delaying the reveal are taking the risk that the info goes to their grave with them, but they are presumably taking this risk for an expected reward. I.e. cop not revealing night one inv, wanting to get more invs in etc etc. Only the player in question can make that judgment call.

[Rysto]

A minor nitpick: did you actually say that? (snipped and bolded)

There's a difference between pointing out or analyzing information that is already public and sharing information which is non-public.

I was counting "conclusions based off of public knowledge" as non-public knowledge.

[ColdPhoenix]

I was counting "conclusions based off of public knowledge" as non-public knowledge.

Why or when would it not be in town's best interests to share these conclusions?

[Rysto]

Why or when would it not be in town's best interests to share these conclusions?
If you've concluded that so-and-so is a power role, keep your mouth shut. This isn't rocket science.

[Zeriel]

You do have to balance that between expected gains for sneakily hinting who you might or might not be to interested parties. For example, I've seen games where a cop and doc have successfully made themselves known to each other in such a way that the cop got a lot of protection while the scum didn't find the doc.

On the other hand, I've seen games (like my first) where the cop breadcrumbed himself hard and the only people who picked up on it were the scum, so it goes.

As always, my thoughts boil down to "We are all smart people, and we are all (especially power roles) able to and required to evaluate the consequences of our various available courses of action."

[Meeko]

I'm not sure where you've seen this, but IME once a scum player has been forced to false claim, it's usually the other scum who are scrutinizing the hardest, in order to earn the most possible credit for "outing" the impostor, and earning the bus credit the fastest.

RE: Rysto's comments. They're good laced with some real bad.

The good: Think about the implications of what you wish to discuss before you discuss it.

The bad: Don't point out things that are based on public information. This is horrible advice. As town, we should assume that our adversaries are playing at the top of their game and not hope that they are missing things out. The possibility of error does exist and we should not discount it in our efforts to determine what is going on, but it should NOT be a guiding principle, or weigh heavily into determining whether or not something which can be distilled from public knowledge should be revealed.

For the most part, this is closer to what I was trying to say. As a townie, if you have non-public information, there appears to be a one best time to say something. If you speak before this, it could be less than optimal for town. However, town always has an uphill battle. I frankly think that the one best time to speak will NEVER come, if everyone waits for the other in a game of chicken.

In my experience, the only way that town gets ahead, is once something ""unexpected"" happens. That is, scum slip in one way or another. Town can then swoop in and reveal this that or the other. Something unexpected happens, a townie sticks his or her neck out, and the game proper begins.

We don't need to assume that Scum play on the top of their game. Scum start XX% ahead of town anyway, that it would approximate a great deal more than Town has period. It may not be the Top of their game, but its a hell of a head start.

The problem is that once you start discussing what makes someone likely to be town or scum, you're giving the scum a nice, handy dandy blueprint for avoiding scumtells and giving off townie vibes. The secret to divining a player's true alignment is in reading their posts and assessing their motivation for posting. Are they answering questions and trying to clear up misunderstandings? Are they talking in circles and clouding up the issues? Granted, you're rarely going to see a post that is clearly nothing but circumspection, but try to look beneath the surface of the post to find the reason it was said. This is why I hate lurking and as the game continues, I wil advocate for the lynching of people who only post 3-4 game related posts a Day. Talking is good. The more talking we have, the more scum slips up and we can catch them.


Right, and my quesiton from the start on Rysto was his motivation. I think the responses on his post all get to "motivation". Why is he saying that? [Again, I would have called this WIFOM if I didn't know any better.]

But, I think we re-hash this part game and game again as well. Mafia will always give Scum a "town blueprint". I know I have compared scum to rectangles and town to squares, and therefore all scum are also town, etc etc, in previous games.

I am not going to rehash that, but, suffice to say, I think handing scum a town blueprint is inevitable. For the most part, experience on either side is enough of a blueprint anyway. I don't think we should worry about it, because I think it happens, regardless. False claims have happened, and Im willing to guess that even more elaborate gambits by scum have occured in other games as well.

Is Day 1 always doomed to come down to a last 24 real world hour segment of discovery / slip / claim and a vote against (using the new information) it?

Talking is good.

I am willing to bet there is an upper limit to this. :D

[Meeko]

You do have to balance that between expected gains for sneakily hinting who you might or might not be to interested parties.

SNIP.

I don't think I did it the best way I could, but you also have a situation where you can overplay your role, once the game pretty much accepts (You are all but Mod-confirmed) you at your word of your claim.

In LOST, I was Sawyer, I told the game, that at game start, I was handed a limited number of bullets* to Vig with. I tried to imply that I was going to go on a spree if I made it to the next night. This was in efforts to get night killed. I held no additional bullets, and I was bluffing.

I still like the move I attempted there. I think it would have worked, if I did something better.


It would not have had a chance of working f I kept my mouth closed earlier. [Then again, let's not forget that I Was basically Mod confirmed due to a rules loophole / backpedal.]

* I don't think I will ever convince you guys that I was not lying. I mean, I had one bullet, and from the start I did have a limited number. And using the rest of my bullets to kill as many people as I could, would still be 0, either way.

[Snickers]

Well, I'm a little grumpy. Mahaloth, I totally understand why you cut me, but I do think you made the subs quite a bit early. (Especially since I told you in the other thread that I'm generally unavailable on weekends.) So I was really excited to see the thread and was just about to make my apologies for getting in late, and bam! I'm already out. It's just unfortunate, is all - it would've been nice if you'd waited a bit longer.

Anyway, I'll watch from the sidelines. Again. My absence probably won't hurt much; I'm a total newb.

[Snickers]

And now I need to apologize to Mahaloth! He'd PM'd me a bunch of times, starting last Thursday. Yeah, I'm crap at checking PMs, but that's really no excuse: had I checked them, I'd have been on the ball, instead of just noticing this today. My bad.

Thanks for the opportunity, though - keep me in mind for next time. And I'll watch and learn.

[Rysto]

And now I need to apologize to Mahaloth! He'd PM'd me a bunch of times, starting last Thursday. Yeah, I'm crap at checking PMs, but that's really no excuse: had I checked them, I'd have been on the ball, instead of just noticing this today. My bad.

You can configure the board to give you a pop-up every time you get a PM. Depending on how many PMs you typically receive(and as you don't check PMs often that's probably not very many), it can be helpful to avoid missing a PM.

[Mahaloth]

And now I need to apologize to Mahaloth!

No problem. I understand.

[ShadowFacts]

Right, now that we're off, I'm going to get on my soapbox for a minute. storyteller often makes the point that in these games, town players tend to be overly cautious about sharing the information that they have. I would agree, but only to a point. Town players definitely have a tendency to jealously hoard the information that comes with their Role. But in my experience, they combine that with a rather inexplicable need to share any and all information they get in other ways. A couple of examples from recent games I've played in come to mind:

In Crimson Glyph, whoever the doctor(me) protected got a notification that they "felt a layer of protection around them" or something similar. What drove me crazy in that game was that the people who I protected immediately posted that fact to the main thread. If they'd stayed quiet, any false doctor claim could have been outed because the false-claiming scum probably couldn't have guessed who had been protected, while the real doctor would have been able to name them all.

Now, as it happens I was a scum doctor and my power was basically a giant red herring for the town, but the point stands. Sharing that kind of information gave Town no benefit and holding it back could give the Town a great benefit.


In Cecil Pond, one of the masons went on a mass voting spree at one point before he'd claimed. About a Day after he did claim, one of the other town players commented that if the scum were to just eliminate all players that the known masons had voted for and all of the scum, they stood a very good chance of uncovering the last unclaimed mason. People jumped on him for saying that, and his defence was that all the information was out in the open and the scum had probably already worked it out. Now, I was scum in that game. It never occurred to any of us that we could do this(we were rather more worried about a non-existent cop, as it happens). The thing was, even if the scum had figured it out, town got no benefit from that fact being in the open. And sometimes, even if the conclusion seems obvious, the scum will miss it! They aren't perfect; they'll miss townie slips just as town players will miss scum slips.

So please, I'm asking all of you: if you are in possession of non-public information, think about whether it should be made public. What benefit is there to town to have that information in the open? What benefit is there to scum?
(bolding mine)

I'm glad Rysto got a meaty discussion happening on Day One, which is a nice change of pace from the usual rigamarole. I think his overall point (bolded) is really spot-on and pretty much indisputable: THINK about what the benefits and drawbacks are to revealing information you might possess before you reveal it. Measure twice, cut once. One of my Mafia flaws is getting worked up and posting emotionally, so this is particularly good advice for me :D

[Trepa Mayfield]

l.

Is Day 1 always doomed to come down to a last 24 real world hour segment of discovery / slip / claim and a vote against (using the new information) it?



Typically, yes. That isn't necessarily bad, though--a good number of times, the slip is really a slip.

[Drain Bead]

Typically, yes. That isn't necessarily bad, though--a good number of times, the slip is really a slip.

And just as frequently, the slip is careless language by a Townie, and the person pointing it out is Scum. I'm not a big fan of the "slip" theory. Very rarely have I seen a true Scum slip.

[Chipacabra]

Unvote Shadowfacts

Wasn't a serious vote anyway, obviously. Actually, I do think I have an idea how to form suspicions in day 0, but it's not a very good one. In particular, how do you tell the difference between someone that's lurking because they're scum laying low from someone that has a power role they're trying to decide how to use, from someone that just has been too busy to post?

I am going to laugh when people cluster up into 'share info' and 'hoard info' factions that have nothing to do with town/scum.

And just so that I have an active vote in case I drop dead for a week:
Vote tiltawhirl

Again, just prodding the not-yet-active.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

And just as frequently, the slip is careless language by a Townie, and the person pointing it out is Scum. I'm not a big fan of the "slip" theory. Very rarely have I seen a true Scum slip.

What's very rare? Or alternatively, what's "true scum slip" mean?

I think it happens once a game or thereabouts that a scum player carelessly says something that reveals a non-town perspective on the game. I apologize if I'm misremembering, but I also think that you were among those who discounted Tom Scud's "overnight thread" in the last game, which by my estimation was certainly a "true scum slip."

[Zeriel]

And just as frequently, the slip is careless language by a Townie, and the person pointing it out is Scum. I'm not a big fan of the "slip" theory. Very rarely have I seen a true Scum slip.

Do we REALLY have to trot out examples of how often the scum actually slips up? Really? Every game?

[Red Skeezix]

And just so that I have an active vote in case I drop dead for a week:
Vote tiltawhirl


(bleached)

Care to give more info about this? Because from where I sit, this is a horrible justification for a vote. Lets examine it closer:

1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet).
2. You are doing this so that at some point if you cease participation you will still have a vote.
3. You are placing a vote of zero accountability. So if/when your vote matters in a close lynch, you cannot possibly be blamed since you just placed your vote based on absence and then disappeared.

How is this scummy/ What's the scum motivation? Leaves you off the "Did not vote" list while making a vote of no accountability.

Yeah, well, it's still early in the day on day 1. But rubbish voting is rubbish voting, no matter what part of what day you do it on.

vote Chipacabra

[Chipacabra]

The comment about dropping dead was a joke, really.

Defending myself:
1) My vote is pretty much entirely designed to encourage participation. In the games I've seen, one of the strongest scum moves is just shut the hell up and stay under the radar while town tears itself down. I don't want to allow that.

2) At this stage of the game, everyone is under equal suspicion. (Including me, so I don't take your vote personally.) I don't expect to vanish. I have lots of free time, and no plans for the immediate future. But even if somehow my internet shuts off or something, I want to have SOMETHING out there to get a paper trail going, both for myself and for all the random people I point at until then.

3) This would be true if I actually do vanish, which I don't intend to. So, I guess I'm locked into staying active this day, which I intended to do.


Is it really that off base to just poke around with random votes early in day 1 and see what shakes loose? There's still lots of time for me to change when someone actually does do something suspicious. If I were doing this later in the day, I could understand your objection, but why do you think that, at this stage of the day, a random vote is scummier than no vote?

[tiltawhirl]

Unvote Shadowfacts

Wasn't a serious vote anyway, obviously. Actually, I do think I have an idea how to form suspicions in day 0, but it's not a very good one. In particular, how do you tell the difference between someone that's lurking because they're scum laying low from someone that has a power role they're trying to decide how to use, from someone that just has been too busy to post?

I am going to laugh when people cluster up into 'share info' and 'hoard info' factions that have nothing to do with town/scum.

And just so that I have an active vote in case I drop dead for a week:
Vote tiltawhirl*

Again, just prodding the not-yet-active.

*color removed

I'm here, I'm here!

Anyhoo, IMO it's to town's advantage if theories of game based on public information are freely shared and discussed. Scum begins with an advantage in that their information is held in common, while town's information is either held by individuals or available to both town and scum. Increasing the amount of public information helps town catch up with scum.

Of course, power players must be very circumspect as to choosing when to claim so as to maximize the information that they collect and the amount of informed play they can make.

[tiltawhirl]

The comment about dropping dead was a joke, really.
Is it really that off base to just poke around with random votes early in day 1 and see what shakes loose? There's still lots of time for me to change when someone actually does do something suspicious. If I were doing this later in the day, I could understand your objection, but why do you think that, at this stage of the day, a random vote is scummier than no vote?

A random vote now implies a random vote at end of Day and sets up a 'that's my arbitrary rule & I'm sticking to it' vote which expressly avoids accountability.

[Freudian Slit]

Voting for someone just for the sake of voting? is that the ghost of peekercpa I see before me? :)

[ShadowFacts]

(bleached)

Care to give more info about this? Because from where I sit, this is a horrible justification for a vote. Lets examine it closer:

1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet).
2. You are doing this so that at some point if you cease participation you will still have a vote.
3. You are placing a vote of zero accountability. So if/when your vote matters in a close lynch, you cannot possibly be blamed since you just placed your vote based on absence and then disappeared.

How is this scummy/ What's the scum motivation? Leaves you off the "Did not vote" list while making a vote of no accountability.

Yeah, well, it's still early in the day on day 1. But rubbish voting is rubbish voting, no matter what part of what day you do it on.

vote Chipacabra

Why did you snip the second reason stated for the vote? For the record, it was:
Again, just prodding the not-yet-active.

[Chipacabra]

Unvote tiltawhirl

I don't believe I ever said I was sticking to my rule. :D If someone does something that's remotely suspicious, gameplan changes, to be sure. But right now, this early in the day, the only suspicious move is not to play!

On that note, pedescribe, you haven't actually said much of anything game related. Speak up, man!

In any case, the last not-yet-active player seems to be Storyteller.
Vote Storyteller


I've been thinking some more of Rysto's original point. In his example, a character saved by the doctor shared the fluff text. In that example, the scum knew who was targetted, and that the nightkill failed, but nothing else. So THOSE are the info points that the townie should share without even thinking about. The fluff text, however, may or may not have been something the scum saw. On the chance that it wasn't, a scum false-claiming to be a doctor wouldn't know what kind of fluff would be sent. By revealing the fluff, the townie gave up a possible shibboleth.

As townies, we don't get a whole lot of opportunities to trip up scum like that. Just be careful you don't waste them, that's all. If you come across something that scum might not know, think about how you can use it!

[Red Skeezix]

Why did you snip the second reason stated for the vote? For the record, it was:

Not sure why it was omitted. Probably just an editing error. You'll note that I did address that reason with my post.

"1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet)."

[Jimmy Chitwood]

I don't think that's really what Rysto's example was. The doctor was, in fact, scum. No scum nightkill had been prevented. The fluff text was more or less bullshit designed to trick the town, and sharing it or not sharing it couldn't actually be used to trip up scum at all. What it could have done was trip up the town; it was a big red herring, after all. Rysto knew damn well which players were being protected, despite the fact that he was scum. If anything, revealing the fluff under those circumstances frustrated Rysto's ability to use the privileged information to hurt the town, since it became public information.

Which is actually a really good demonstration of why general, abstracted rules about how to play are very difficult to use to any effectiveness. Except for the critical fact that it was a scum doctor and not a town doctor that was giving the protection, X Y and Z could have been important. But you know, that wasn't the case. Sometimes information, by design, is a misdirection. I'm not sure there's a pre-game speech that can protect against that.

[Chipacabra]

Even using the same example with the scum doctor. If you keep the fluff secret, and scum doctor reveals as a doctor, then the townies aren't actually any worse off! The scum doctor (That's kind of fun to say. It's my new band name) couldn't have actually used the privileged information to hurt the town, since knowing that information just lets him do what the town allowed him to do anyway by sharing the info. Hiding the fluff wouldn't have payed off in that example, but it wouldn't actually have hurt the townies as far as I can see, and it COULD have helped.

I guess I forgot to say earlier, since I had it in mind. These hidden bits of info can be used to trip up a scum, but they can't be used to exonerate a townie. In a doctor example, if you hide the fluff and someone reveals as doctor and gives the CORRECT shibboleth, that's not enough to exonerate them. As you say, it could have been a scum doctor, or a lucky guess, or leaked info. It's when scum gives an INCORRECT code that hiding the info pays off, and if you give away the info too cheaply you lose even that chance.

[Meeko]

Voting for someone just for the sake of voting? is that the ghost of peekercpa I see before me? :)



Unvote tiltawhirl

Vote Storyteller


I second Freudian here, an over eager vote, and then a vote for story?


RoOsh : ToeJam :: Peeker : Tiltawhirl ?

:eek:


Peeker shouldn't put me in the fetal position. But even so, you have me wondering.

[Chipacabra]

It's better than voting for Story because he just had a win in Malazan, and it's not fair to have two in a row. ;)

[Mahaloth]

And, now we get our first vote count.

Vote Count:

Storyteller(1): Chipacabra

Chipacabra(1): Red Skeezix

[ShadowFacts]

Not sure why it was omitted. Probably just an editing error. You'll note that I did address that reason with my post.

"1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet)."

Yeah, you did mention it, but you did it as part of a larger argument, which I think slightly misrepresented Chipacabra's reasoning for the vote. The original post was, in its entirety:
Unvote Shadowfacts

Wasn't a serious vote anyway, obviously. Actually, I do think I have an idea how to form suspicions in day 0, but it's not a very good one. In particular, how do you tell the difference between someone that's lurking because they're scum laying low from someone that has a power role they're trying to decide how to use, from someone that just has been too busy to post?

I am going to laugh when people cluster up into 'share info' and 'hoard info' factions that have nothing to do with town/scum.

And just so that I have an active vote in case I drop dead for a week:
Vote tiltawhirl

Again, just prodding the not-yet-active.

I've bolded the most relevant part (IMO). There are clearly two reasons stated for the vote:
1. Having something in place in case he (?) does not return before end of day.
2. Prodding non-participators

YOUR response post and vote clips the second reason and mostly ignores it in your analysis. As I acknowledged above, you include it in your list, but as part of a larger criticism that focuses on #1. If someone wasn't reading carefully, they would have thought that Chipacabra only had one reason for the vote instead of two. This is compounded by your use of the singular "justification" in your vote post.

The fact is that prodding people is a pretty good reason to vote for someone (particularly on day one). It has already produced results in this very game. It pinged me the way you seemed to ignore/downplay that aspect of his vote. Since this is the only (minutely, I admit) suspicious thing I've seen, I'll put my money where my mouth is:

Vote Red Skeezix

[Meeko]

Not sure why it was omitted. Probably just an editing error. You'll note that I did address that reason with my post.

"1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet)."

Yeah, you did mention it, but you did it as part of a larger argument, which I think slightly misrepresented Chipacabra's reasoning for the vote. The original post was, in its entirety:


I've bolded the most relevant part (IMO). There are clearly two reasons stated for the vote:
1. Having something in place in case he (?) does not return before end of day.
2. Prodding non-participators

YOUR response post and vote clips the second reason and mostly ignores it in your analysis. As I acknowledged above, you include it in your list, but as part of a larger criticism that focuses on #1. If someone wasn't reading carefully, they would have thought that Chipacabra only had one reason for the vote instead of two. This is compounded by your use of the singular "justification" in your vote post.

The fact is that prodding people is a pretty good reason to vote for someone (particularly on day one). It has already produced results in this very game. It pinged me the way you seemed to ignore/downplay that aspect of his vote. Since this is the only (minutely, I admit) suspicious thing I've seen, I'll put my money where my mouth is:




The entire "Editing Error" followed by the reasons shopping doesn't sit too well with me either.

[peekercpa]

and just because i think another vote count is in order (because it may be a long time till the next one if i have any say in the process).

story - 1 (chipacabra - 145)

chipasomethingorother - 1 (red - 139)

skeezy - 1 (shadow - 152)

shadow - 0 (chip 114 136)

tilt - 0 (chippy - 136 145)

and if any of the above is incorrect please let maha know. i am merely the unpaid understudy and he is the nutcase that enlisted me.

[Mahaloth]

I guess this is a good time to introduce our co-mod, peekercpa.

His "role" is the troll from the first book. ;)

[Drain Bead]

I guess this is a good time to introduce our co-mod, peekercpa.

His "role" is the troll from the first book. ;)

TROLL IN THE DUNGEON! (http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/38376505/1105396)

[Mahaloth]

And, uh, Day One does end in about 47 hours, folks.

:)

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Jebus, does it really now.

Hey ShadowFacts and those sympathetic to the cause: do you really think that was a material misrepresentation by Skeezix? It said right there in point #1 that the vote was intended to prod a non-participant, and nothing in the post served to dismiss the point or suggest that it wasn't a reason for the vote, so I don't understand the objection.

I'm more inclined to say that ShadowFacts' saying that the post was snipped to take out the second reason is a misrepresentation of Skeezix than to say that Skeezix misrepresented Chip. And since that's kind of the only thing going, let's have it out.

Chip said, in the entirety:

Unvote Shadowfacts

Wasn't a serious vote anyway, obviously. Actually, I do think I have an idea how to form suspicions in day 0, but it's not a very good one. In particular, how do you tell the difference between someone that's lurking because they're scum laying low from someone that has a power role they're trying to decide how to use, from someone that just has been too busy to post?

I am going to laugh when people cluster up into 'share info' and 'hoard info' factions that have nothing to do with town/scum.

And just so that I have an active vote in case I drop dead for a week:
Vote tiltawhirl

Again, just prodding the not-yet-active.

Skeezix snipped everything but the voting sentence; before and after. And characterized the reasons for Chip's vote as:

1. You are voting for someone who is not participating (albeit, yet).
2. You are doing this so that at some point if you cease participation you will still have a vote.
3. You are placing a vote of zero accountability. So if/when your vote matters in a close lynch, you cannot possibly be blamed since you just placed your vote based on absence and then disappeared.

Then ShadowFacts says that this "snip(ped) the second reason stated for the vote," and then later says it "mostly ignores it in your analysis." It seems to me that this just isn't what happened at all, and I can't figure why it seems suspicious. It's right there, number one!

Chip said something, and voted. Skeezix quoted the vote, and responded to the thing Chip said while paraphrasing it accurately. Why is it in town's interest to attack that behavior? If everybody quoted the entirety of everybody's post, every post would look like this one, and nobody wants that.

[Meeko]

Chip said something, and voted. Skeezix quoted the vote, and responded to the thing Chip said while paraphrasing it accurately. Why is it in town's interest to attack that behavior? If everybody quoted the entirety of everybody's post, every post would look like this one, and nobody wants that.


So are you saying that some mis-characterization of posts is allowable?

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Are you... not being ironic?

[ShadowFacts]

Hey ShadowFacts and those sympathetic to the cause: do you really think that was a material misrepresentation by Skeezix?

No, I thought it was a slight misrepresentation, which is what I called it in my explanation. It may be nothing at all, but I'm putting it out there, and I am interested in hearing what Red and the rest of you have to say about it. You obviously disagree fairly strongly. If you think I am misrepresenting Red, feel free to vote for me (not that you need my permission). Let's get this party started.

[Chipacabra]

Well, I've gone from vague suspicion that Story's lurking to vague worry that he missed the start of the game or something. Also, I don't think there's any big danger of Story not speaking up when he DOES show up, so

Unvote Story

I'm going to take some time to muse over what's been stirred up so far. I've got suspicions about Skeezix, but not necessarily enough to warrant a vote (other than for the sake of OMGUS).

Time to think about this. And do yardwork. Yay yardwork.

[Red Skeezix]

( Following quotes have been Bleached, some pieces have been snipped)

Yeah, you did mention it, but you did it as part of a larger argument, which I think slightly misrepresented Chipacabra's reasoning for the vote.


Yes, I did mention it as part of a larger argument, as it was presented as a point in a larger case. I think the the argument that he was making as a whole is bad, and it is not hard to see, at least to me, how his actions are scummy. The lurker (sort of, since he's voting for people who may not be aware the day has even started) voting + he's voting so that he has a vote down.


I've bolded the most relevant part (IMO). There are clearly two reasons stated for the vote:
1. Having something in place in case he (?) does not return before end of day.
2. Prodding non-participators


YOUR response post and vote clips the second reason and mostly ignores it in your analysis. As I acknowledged above, you include it in your list, but as part of a larger criticism that focuses on #1. If someone wasn't reading carefully, they would have thought that Chipacabra only had one reason for the vote instead of two. This is compounded by your use of the singular "justification" in your vote post.


It does not mostly ignore it (the fact that the vote was a prod) my analysis. I mention it specifically and as the opening in how I was interpreting the vote. And I allude to it when I say it is a vote of no accountability. There is no arguing with the fact that he's voting for a person who is absent, but his vote says nothing other than: "So and So" hasn't shown up yet and I want to make sure I have a vote down at the end of the day. (Which is what I said in my original case.)


The fact is that prodding people is a pretty good reason to vote for someone (particularly on day one). It has already produced results in this very game.


I disagree. You cannot attribute a cause and effect relationship between prods and people showing up to play, especially at this point in the game. Furthermore, prod votes are a good place for scum to park votes (because they don't force scum to fabricate a reasoning) during the day especially if the prodded never respond to the prod.

It pinged me the way you seemed to ignore/downplay that aspect [the prodding nature] of his vote.


(Quote clarification added, please advise if I'm missing the point)

Saying that I ignored/downplayed that aspect of the vote is either disingenuous or a misconception on your part. I considered it as part of the whole reason for his vote, and made my case accordingly.


Since this is the only (minutely, I admit) suspicious thing I've seen, I'll put my money where my mouth is:

Vote Red Skeezix


In conclusion and for the point of clarification:

I am voting Chipacabra because his vote is especially weak, and it bears no accountability, all while providing the benefit of appearing to do something pro-town aka voting.

[Red Skeezix]

The entire "Editing Error" followed by the reasons shopping doesn't sit too well with me either.

What do you mean by "reasons shopping"?

[Chipacabra]

Hmm. Still sticking with that? I've explained what I'm doing, and I think I've been pretty clearly acting to stir up information, not to cover my own ass.

I mean, you're voting for me because my vote is weak, when I don't even have a vote out there right now.

Frankly, I was suspicious from the beginning, but there were a lot of possibilities and not all of them mean you're scum. But those are seeming less and less likely now. You've talked yourself into this.

Vote Red Skeezix

Feel free to talk yourself out of it again, I'm still listening.

Also, thanks for distracting me from the yardwork I SHOULD be doing. I really need to stop hitting refresh so much...

[Red Skeezix]

Hmm. Still sticking with that? I've explained what I'm doing, and I think I've been pretty clearly acting to stir up information, not to cover my own ass.


Obviously, you are not covering your ass with that strategy, since I've called you out on it. Whether or not you were attempting to originally, remains to be seen.


I mean, you're voting for me because my vote is weak, when I don't even have a vote out there right now.


I'm voting for you for your reasoning and vote on tiltawhirl; the fact that you've unvoted since has no bearing on my vote.


Frankly, I was suspicious from the beginning, but there were a lot of possibilities and not all of them mean you're scum. But those are seeming less and less likely now. You've talked yourself into this.

Vote Red Skeezix


I'm not sure if you are trying to bully me with a vote or not here. I assure you, that if that is the case, that your vote based on what looks like more spurious reasoning does not give me pause about my own vote.

[Meeko]

What do you mean by "reasons shopping"?

Cherry Picking.

I was following Shadow's line against you, on how you appeared to not give Chip a fair shake.*

I'm gonna step back from any advanced, but still-yet-to-vote, position, as it looks like this is heating up.

It would appear that someone somewhere is on to something, and I think voting in the thick of it would be premature.

* FTR: I'm further away from this position now, than I was earlier.

[Chipacabra]

I'm not sure if you are trying to bully me with a vote or not here. I assure you, that if that is the case, that your vote based on what looks like more spurious reasoning does not give me pause about my own vote.

Nope, not a bully vote. Right now, you are the most suspicious person to me. Your original vote against me didn't really set off alarm bells. Your defense of your vote has. As far as I can tell, you look like either scum, or opposed to my efforts to find scum.

Points:
1) Your vote against me is NOT a direct factor. In fact, the post where you vote against me struck me originally as possibly just being a townie that misunderstood what I'm doing. I can hardly blame you for a weak vote when I'm admitting that my prod votes are weak!

2) I told you directly what I'm doing (prodding inactive players) and asked you straight out if I was wrong to do so. You did not answer. You've addressed other people, but not me until I directly accused you. This makes your protest that you aren't cherrypicking seem really weak to me.

3) You are hung up on my vote against tiltawhirl, even though I also prodded Shadowfacts and Storyteller. Why tiltawhirl in particular? I considered the possibility that you were both masons and you were just trying to emphasize the weakness of my vote so tilt wouldn't get dogpiled. But if that were the case, you'd have reconsidered after my vote moved on to Story. So your continued vote says you do want suspicion aimed at me, and aren't interested in suspicion aimed anywhere else. And that makes me suspicious!

[Red Skeezix]

Nope, not a bully vote. Right now, you are the most suspicious person to me. Your original vote against me didn't really set off alarm bells. Your defense of your vote has. As far as I can tell, you look like either scum, or opposed to my efforts to find scum.

Points:
1) Your vote against me is NOT a direct factor. In fact, the post where you vote against me struck me originally as possibly just being a townie that misunderstood what I'm doing. I can hardly blame you for a weak vote when I'm admitting that my prod votes are weak!


Ok, it's not a direct factor. Fair enough.


2) I told you directly what I'm doing (prodding inactive players) and asked you straight out if I was wrong to do so. You did not answer. You've addressed other people, but not me until I directly accused you. This makes your protest that you aren't cherrypicking seem really weak to me.


I assume this and it's linked post are what you are referring to here. I thought I had explained these points before you asked the questions, but apparently I had not been as clear as I thought.


Is it really that off base to just poke around with random votes early in day 1 and see what shakes loose? There's still lots of time for me to change when someone actually does do something suspicious. If I were doing this later in the day, I could understand your objection, but why do you think that, at this stage of the day, a random vote is scummier than no vote?

A random vote is always scummy no matter when it is cast, because it leaves a player without accountability for their actions. A player who does not cast a vote all day is equally scummy for all the same reasons. A player who has not posted yet is not especially suspicious to me.


3) You are hung up on my vote against tiltawhirl, even though I also prodded Shadowfacts and Storyteller. Why tiltawhirl in particular? I considered the possibility that you were both masons and you were just trying to emphasize the weakness of my vote so tilt wouldn't get dogpiled. But if that were the case, you'd have reconsidered after my vote moved on to Story.

1. I'm not hung up about the fact that you voted for tiltawhirl, who you voted for is irrelevant to me. I'm hung up on how you voted for tiltawhirl, and what the implications of that vote are.

2. I didn't even see your vote for shadowfacts until I saw your vote for tiltawhirl.

3. I had already made a case against you for your tiltawhirl vote when you made your storyteller vote. It seems like you were trying to shake loose suspicion by moving your vote at the first opportunity.

So your continued vote says you do want suspicion aimed at me, and aren't interested in suspicion aimed anywhere else. And that makes me suspicious!

I do want suspicion aimed at you, because I think you are scum. Hence the vote. But my suspicion is not exclusive, I am also willing to discuss other people who are behaving suspiciously, but for now that is you.

[Chipacabra]

Yeah, not convinced. Either you're scum, or you're not reading the thread. Either way, my vote stands for now.


OK, so for those that haven't caught on, despite me explicitly stating it, this has been my plan with every single I've made until Red. Cause noise, see what happens.

See, I haven't played forum mafia, but I've played live action werewolf, and you get something similar on day 1, no one knows who to vote for. If no one has a plan, eventually someone will just accuse someone they have a grudge against, and you run from there. Not very helpful.

So one thing town learns to do is spend day 1 pointing at random people, screaming "YOU DID IT!" and see if they flinch. Sometimes you even catch people this way, the poor saps that are bad at keeping secrets. But sooner or later, the scum learns to clam up.

Indeed, on a forum, it's even easier to clam up. Just don't type. We can't see your facial expression to tell if we hit a nerve.

Back to the live action story, I realized that you can still learn useful stuff with wild accusations thrown fast and loose. The trick is, you don't watch the accused, you watch everyone else. Anyone could look relieved or shocked when the finger is pointed at someone else, but once in a while you'll catch a glimpse of someone that is annoyed that someone else was targeted. Why could that be? It's a hint that they're scum, and they're annoyed that you're drawing attention to their scum brethren. Or maybe they're a mason annoyed that another mason is being pointed at. Or maybe something else.

Point is, someone flinched, and now you have a line of inquiry. And now in this game someone has flinched, and now there is a line of inquiry.

[ShadowFacts]

Red, I'm not sure it's productive at this point for me to respond point by point in a huge wall of quotes (though I will if you feel I have not explained myself well enough). I did want to respond to one thing:

I disagree. You cannot attribute a cause and effect relationship between prods and people showing up to play, especially at this point in the game. Furthermore, prod votes are a good place for scum to park votes (because they don't force scum to fabricate a reasoning) during the day especially if the prodded never respond to the prod.

In this game, at least, I think you are wrong about the first point. His first vote was for me, and it did, in fact, prod me to get in sooner rather than later. Not that I wasn't planning to dive in, but getting a vote did put a little fire under the feet. (Of course, you only have my word for that). More factually, we know that tiltawhirl responded to Chipa's vote with "I'm here! I'm here!" one hour later. So, to me, that's cause and effect evidence. Do you disagree?

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(1): Red Skeezix

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Day ends Thursday at Noon Eastern.

[Red Skeezix]

Red, I'm not sure it's productive at this point for me to respond point by point in a huge wall of quotes (though I will if you feel I have not explained myself well enough). I did want to respond to one thing:

In this game, at least, I think you are wrong about the first point. His first vote was for me, and it did, in fact, prod me to get in sooner rather than later. Not that I wasn't planning to dive in, but getting a vote did put a little fire under the feet. (Of course, you only have my word for that). More factually, we know that tiltawhirl responded to Chipa's vote with "I'm here! I'm here!" one hour later. So, to me, that's cause and effect evidence. Do you disagree?

Three players were prodded:

1. Shadowfacts: Came in started reading and placed a vote and have continued to participate.
2. tiltawhirl: Came in and made a couple of posts and has been gone > 24 hours.
3. storyteller: Has yet to appear.

Using this game as a sole reference, it would have 1/3 (1/2 if we count tiltawhirl's limited participation as something) correlation of action (prod) implying desired reaction (participation). Not exactly cause and effect, is it? So yes I'd tend to disagree: in most cases (using this game 50%-66% of the time) prodding does squat except provide scum with the wherewithal to couch votes.

[One And Only Wanderers]

Point is, someone flinched, and now you have a line of inquiry. And now in this game someone has flinched, and now there is a line of inquiry.

Can you elaborate on the flinch you are pursuing here. If I read you right, you are suggesting the possibility of one of the inactive's you voted being scum, with Red as a scum buddy reacting to teh vote on his team member. Have I read you crrectly? If so which of the 3 votes do you see him as having flimched at?

[Chipacabra]

That's a good question. If Red were a mason, which I'm fairly sure he's not, I'd say for sure he flinched at tilt.

As a scum flinch, though, not as sure. Probably not Shadow. He could have been jumping at me thinking that I'd move on to Story next, but that doesn't seem likely.

So, still guessing the flinch was at the tilt vote, because he showed no signs of even noticing the other votes/unvotes. I even made sure to bold them like the nice mods told me to.

Trying to cover for tilt just seems like such a... clumsy scum mistake, though. That's what's keeping me from getting 100% behind my own vote, heh.

But the more Red tries to defend his stance, the less his arguments seem to make sense to me, from a town perspective. Maybe he just has a different idea of how town should play, but that just doesn't feel like it to me.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

Back to the live action story, I realized that you can still learn useful stuff with wild accusations thrown fast and loose. The trick is, you don't watch the accused, you watch everyone else. Anyone could look relieved or shocked when the finger is pointed at someone else, but once in a while you'll catch a glimpse of someone that is annoyed that someone else was targeted. Why could that be? It's a hint that they're scum, and they're annoyed that you're drawing attention to their scum brethren. Or maybe they're a mason annoyed that another mason is being pointed at. Or maybe something else.
This makes sense but four players posted in reaction to your vote or subsequent defense: Red, Tilta herself, Freudian and Meeko. Is it not possible that your vote reasoning was scummy in itself and so any flinching was a normal reaction? Or do you think that Freudian and Meeko are also scummy?

While we're here, could you explain this comment a little? I'm sure it was intended as humor but the reference to the color confused me and has been bugging me:
Well, now we know that OAOW is a muggle. Which doesn't help at all. Hmmmmm.

[One And Only Wanderers]

+1 it confused me too, but I forgot to ask

[Rysto]

While we're here, could you explain this comment a little? I'm sure it was intended as humor but the reference to the color confused me and has been bugging me:

OAOW posted something about the England-Germany soccer game, and as only Muggles care about soccer that proved that he was a Muggle.

[One And Only Wanderers]

Wasn't one of the students at Hogwarts a West Ham fan?

[Rysto]

Wasn't one of the students at Hogwarts a West Ham fan?

Dean Brown. He was Muggleborn. I just explained the joke; I didn't say that it precisely matched the colour.

Edit: Ok, if you want to get really technical you could call him a half-blood. JKR ended up dropping a storyline that had Dean discovering that his father was actually a wizard. Whether Dean's father being a wizard is canonical is debatable.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Dean Thomas, but yeah, muggle family explains why he'd follow the EPL.

What have I become?

[tiltawhirl]

That's a good question. If Red were a mason, which I'm fairly sure he's not, I'd say for sure he flinched at tilt.

As a scum flinch, though, not as sure. Probably not Shadow. He could have been jumping at me thinking that I'd move on to Story next, but that doesn't seem likely.

So, still guessing the flinch was at the tilt vote, because he showed no signs of even noticing the other votes/unvotes. I even made sure to bold them like the nice mods told me to.

Trying to cover for tilt just seems like such a... clumsy scum mistake, though. That's what's keeping me from getting 100% behind my own vote, heh.

But the more Red tries to defend his stance, the less his arguments seem to make sense to me, from a town perspective. Maybe he just has a different idea of how town should play, but that just doesn't feel like it to me.

...but your vote on me was just a placeholder and the only one I had received. Did anyone think that I was in immediate danger from a single vote, enough for someone to feel the need to jump in & save me? Isn't it more plausible that Red Skeezix is doing the same thing you are, i.e. pushing hard to find the smallest possible scum slip?

[Rysto]

Dean Thomas
:smack:

I blame it on being awake for over 24 hours now combined with severe hockey withdrawal.

[Drain Bead]

I've been thinking about the voting to prod people. I'm not a fan of LtL early--later it might become a valid strategy, but early in the game I generally tend to be a low-volume poster as I get my bearings, and it has no bearing on whether or not I'm Town or Scum.

That having been said, I think that reasonable minds might disagree on the subject. I don't necessarily think that Chip's votes were no-accountability--I find early "me too" votes to be much more annoying in that respect. The vote-as-prod is a strategy that people have employed multiple times in multiple games. Sometimes they get called out as scummy, sometimes not. If I had time, which I never ever do, I'd go back and look at games in which something like this happened and see how they broke down--is it really more likely that someone who votes to prod another player is Scum? Is the lurker ever Scum? It would be a fun meta-game analysis that I'm entirely not up for. ;) And knowing that info might actually help us here.

Also, I'm not sure if I agree with Red's analysis of whether or not prodding actually works. I'm more on the side of ShadowFacts in that one--it appears that the prodding got two of three people to participate at some level, and I'm not sure what's going on with storyteller--it certainly isn't like him to miss the start of a game like this.

This game seems rather tepid to start out with. I almost wish for peeker to show up and vote storyteller so we can actually have something to argue about.

[One And Only Wanderers]

If the co mod starts voting you can be damn sure we'll argue!

[Rysto]

I feel kinda crappy about posting a vote with only two posts to go on, but we're rapidly approaching our last 24 hours and I need to get more vote in soon, as I'm not likely to be around tonight.

Good post, Rysto. I think we should def take that to heart.

I remember in the scum pond game getting a little flack for not having claimed, though, at the same time. It's always very confusing--should you share? Should you not? Tough decisions.
This post immediately jumped out at me. My biggest problem with this was the fact that there really is nothing useful in this post at all. It's barely -- just barely -- a step above posting pure fluff. Freudian says "me, too" to my opinion and that's pretty well it. There's no content here, no analysis, no nothing. This reads to me like a post that Freudian made for the sake of posting something. And in my experience, a scum player is far more likely to feel pressure to post something and at least look like they are participating.

Also, note the snuggle.

Voting for someone just for the sake of voting? is that the ghost of peekercpa I see before me? :)

Not much to talk about here, which really is my point. It's really hard to allege a trend based on 2 posts, but this is the best that I have.

Vote Freudian

[peekercpa]

This game seems rather tepid to start out with. I almost wish for peeker to show up and vote storyteller so we can actually have something to argue about.

<snipped>

because this is my first time kind of semi doing something other than playing and hoping that everyone has an enjoyable experience, plus the fact you know i adore you:

vote storyteller. :)

[Zeriel]

<snipped>

because this is my first time kind of semi doing something other than playing and hoping that everyone has an enjoyable experience, plus the fact you know i adore you:

vote storyteller. :)

Might as well make it traditional: vote peekercpa:D

[Zeriel]

unvote peekercpa

Seriously, though. There's some information out there. There's some stuff that it's possible to get a sniff from. What we need is a good rip-roaring unequivocal accusation of scumminess, and I'm re-reading hoping to find just that.

[Freudian Slit]

Sorry, I've been kind of busy these past few days. I know, I know...anyway, I'm going to try to review tonight, like after five, and then make a vote. Sorry, all and maha.

[Meeko]

Welcome to Mafia. ;)

As one of the Masons involved in the previously-mentioned debacle, I agree that Town should always consider who would benefit most from the information if it's out there.

(bolding mine)

I'm glad Rysto got a meaty discussion happening on Day One, which is a nice change of pace from the usual rigamarole. I think his overall point (bolded) is really spot-on and pretty much indisputable: THINK about what the benefits and drawbacks are to revealing information you might possess before you reveal it. Measure twice, cut once. One of my Mafia flaws is getting worked up and posting emotionally, so this is particularly good advice for me :D

Ok, I would like to think that I'm getting bits and pieces here.

Drain, if you want to clarify anything for my benefit, please go ahead. Or if you would rather not rehash that.......

I just feel wooshed here, about something from a previous game. Especially after I ask you guys to be blunt.

Related: Shadow, I would like to think that I too am one for the measure twice cut once, but where is that information once the game-state has changed, and a given set of moves a player has forces their hand?

[Meeko]

Wasn't a serious vote anyway, obviously. Actually, I do think I have an idea how to form suspicions in day 0, but it's not a very good one.

Snipped.


Defending myself:
1) My vote is pretty much entirely designed to encourage participation. In the games I've seen, one of the strongest scum moves is just shut the hell up and stay under the radar while town tears itself down. I don't want to allow that.


Snipped.

Is the second post your "idea" from post one manifest?

Has the idea improved in "goodness" that much in the 4-5 posts in-between?

I can't shake that you are creating a "Follow me Townies, for I have found the one and only way to deduce information, follow me without question, do not look at the man behind the curtain, and I will lead you into.......


... a town loss."

Type of situation. Don't confuse you with the details. Don't stop to ask if you yourself are Town.


Just where I am at the moment.

[Meeko]

Hmm. Still sticking with that? I've explained what I'm doing, and I think I've been pretty clearly acting to stir up information, not to cover my own ass.

It might not be totally fair, but Peeker has tainted my opinion of stirring, or pot stirring. In my book they are the same.

At best, you are a newer player (but I don't get that vibe, seeing as how IIRC you refer to other games you have played in, and wasn't Mazatlan or what ever an advanced game?.) who doesn't have a clue.

At worst, your vote swapping (Are you on your 6th vote now?) is nothing but confusion, misdirection, and distraction.

A Me Too! here for getting votes in with little justification, in effort to garner Town cred over a non-voter, all while not having to create a false reason to vote a townie.


You are a distraction. I fear it is dividing my attention to much, in a game that is already divided.


Vote Chipacabra


And I know this probably invites a ton of heat on me. I would like to think that I am still learning. Let me anticipate that argument:

"It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop." -Confucius


I would like to think that Rysto, Shadow, or Skeezix are distracting the game as well. However, I can't begin to disect that, based on how well I play the game. I think everyone would conclude I don't play the game that well.

I wonder if the "Don't Say X" argument is cut from the same cloth of "Double Lynching" and other, older mechanics in older games.



A big stinking pile of nowhere fast.


Scum would love to throw a huge bag of attention as FAR away from them as possible at the start of each game.

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(2): Red Skeezix, Meeko

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto


So....24 hours left in Day One.

Really.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

This reads to me like a post that Freudian made for the sake of posting something. And in my experience, a scum player is far more likely to feel pressure to post something and at least look like they are participating./snipped
Do you find Pedescribe (#113 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12625265&postcount=113), #116 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12626013&postcount=116) or #134 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12627902&postcount=134)) and Little Plastic Ninja (#111 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12624889&postcount=111)) equally suspicious or is posting pure fluff less scummy than trying to disguise fluff as content?

Speaking of posting for the sake of posting something, while I liked your soapbox speech and the discussion it generated, when you said, in reference to disclosing non-public information: This isn't rocket science. I couldn't help thinking you were either trying to poke someone who annoyed you in a previous game (and therefore the Mhaye speech would be appropriate) or were simply starting discussion for the sake of it.

[Rysto]

/snipped
Do you find Pedescribe (#113 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12625265&postcount=113), #116 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12626013&postcount=116) or #134 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12627902&postcount=134)) and Little Plastic Ninja (#111 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=12624889&postcount=111)) equally suspicious or is posting pure fluff less scummy than trying to disguise fluff as content?
Pure fluff does not worry me too much. Pretty much everybody posts fluff from time to time. Freudian's post jumped out at me because she was talking about an actual game-related post but didn't actually say anything.

To put it in scum-motivation terms, the motivation for posting fluff is that it's fun. That motivation applies equally well to townies and scum. On the other hand, there's a lot of scum motivation for posting contentless posts that address some part of the game. For scum, talking is dangerous. They could slip, they could contradict themselves, they could hem themselves into performing an action that they really don't want to do. But not talking is also dangerous, because sooner or later the town will punish such behaviour. All too often in our games the best strategy for scum is to walk that line where you are posting enough to not be considered a lurker while posting as little as possible actual content. I don't see a strong town motivation for doing such a thing.

Speaking of posting for the sake of posting something, while I liked your soapbox speech and the discussion it generated, when you said, in reference to disclosing non-public information: I couldn't help thinking you were either trying to poke someone who annoyed you in a previous game (and therefore the Mhaye speech would be appropriate) or were simply starting discussion for the sake of it.
I posted it because I have observed what I think is a pattern in town behaviour that I don't think is a pro-Town thing. I wasn't trying to call out any specific player -- in the two examples that I gave, the offending players aren't even playing in this game. Those were just recent examples that cam to mind.

[Rysto]

Pure fluff does not worry me too much.

Let me clarify this. A post that contains pure fluff does not worry me too much. If a player is posting nothing but fluff; that's when I start to get concerned.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

@ Rysto, thanks, it's clear. When you said that it wasn't "rocket science", I thought you were being a little condescending and so I questioned your motives for giving a soapbox speech on something that you consider quite obvious.

[Omi no Kami]

Gah, I hate first day votes: I'm almost never confident about anyone, and while I acknowledge that we have to "push" people and that voting can be a good way of both eliciting behavior and seeing who behaves strangely under pressure, I always end up feeling like I'm being a jerk by accusing potential townies of villainy based on (usually) small evidence.

In any case, I've been nursing a few idle suspicions:

I was initially concerned about Rysto when the semantic debate bubbled up in the wake of his post on information disclosure, especially when it went on for a bit, but he defended and clarified his points in a pretty no-nonsense way, and while I thought he was a bit antagonistic toward some of the critics, at this point I see nothing suspicious about the way he behaved during that discussion.

Moving on, we have the Red Skeezix/Chipacabra dustup. Red got way too bent out of shape over the initial accusation, especially considering that it came on the first day. His immediate, subsequent posts gave me the feeling that he was "scrambling" a bit to establish a front of innocence, and even though he since seems to have evened out, the fact that his initial reaction was so out of whack with that of the other players is a huge, blaring sign.

Chipacabra, on the other hand, just annoys me-his initial voting behavior was not atypical of day 1 players, openly voting to provoke a response, but the way he admitted that he was voting without having a clear suspicion in mind irks me: if you vote for someone, you need to be willing to back that vote up, and his comments sounded to me like he was trying to get a free pass- vote for people to see what happens, but since you've already admitted that you don't have a logical basis for voting beyond your general strategy, if the person you vote for ends up being a townie you can expect yourself to be held blameless. I think this entirely defeats the purpose of voting, as randomly harassing players might help find scum, but it makes it really difficult for us to examine YOUR voting record and reach any conclusion about your behavior and possible undisclosed alliances from it.

Finally, Freudian Slit hasn't done anything to make me suspicious, but he is borderline-lurking, and being on the verge of ending a day with close to no idea about where he's at annoys me.

Lurkers almost always draw the group's ire eventually, and this is only the first day, so I'm happy to give Freudian more time to play and establish a track record.

Between Red Skeezix and Chipacabra I honestly don't know: I find them both highly suspicious, and honestly if one of them were to be lynched on day 1 I would still keep an eye on the next one on day 2, because I think they've both shown cracks, and neither has done a sufficient job of convincing me of their guilt or innocence.

However, at this time I think Chipacabra has been more detrimental to overall progress: he's dominated the group's attention with the disclaimer-filled rapid-fire voting, and frankly I'm so sick of hearing him re-hash the same points without progress in either direction that my eyes practically glaze over whenever I log on to find another long wall of quotations and text. Both he and Red look shady, but at this point I think Chipacabra has done a lot more to hurt the Town's effort: he's dominated a lot of the day's discussion, and in doing so prevented us from hearing (and evaluating) more from a greater range of players.

Because of that, I'm going to
Vote Chipacabra
Off the boarding school

[Rysto]

(psst ... Freudian is a she)

[Omi no Kami]

Oops! My mistake, sorry Freudian... I should've seen the obvious joke/reference in the username (in retrospect, :smack:).

I'm assuming edits get us insta-killed by the ever-compassionate mod, so I'll just suggest that anybody reading my last post mentally substitute "she, her, hers," and so forth where appropriate. ^^

[Drain Bead]

Ok, I would like to think that I'm getting bits and pieces here.

Drain, if you want to clarify anything for my benefit, please go ahead. Or if you would rather not rehash that.......

Well, what I'm getting at is not aimed at what you did in that game, although it would have been nice had you been a bit more circumspect. I was always more angry at sachertorte, especially when I later realized that the Scum never would have thought to look at your vote record had it not been for sach bringing it up.

[Drain Bead]

Gah, I hate first day votes: I'm almost never confident about anyone, and while I acknowledge that we have to "push" people and that voting can be a good way of both eliciting behavior and seeing who behaves strangely under pressure, I always end up feeling like I'm being a jerk by accusing potential townies of villainy based on (usually) small evidence.

This kind of language really gets on my nerves. To me it reads like someone who knows that they're going to be following it up by analyzing and voting for the behavior of someone who is townie. There was this old game a while ago, I think an SDMB game but it may have been on Idle, where someone said "this Day was a disaster" after a bunch of power role claims...but before the actual lynch occurred. Had the lynchee been Scum, the Day would not have been all that bad...so it sure seemed like that person knew they were about to lynch a Town player. It's those kind of slips that are the only ones I think are more likely to be made by a Scum player than a Townie. When I'm Scum, I frequently whine and hem and haw about how much Day One sucks, usually because I know I am joining a bandwagon on a Townie. And yeah, Day One might suck, but then again it might not. And Town shouldn't know how much it's sucking until it's over.

As I said earlier, the Chip vs. Skeezix argument doesn't really draw me in on either side, but this is enough for me to place a vote.

vote Omi no Kami

(And if past history in SDMB games are any indication, I'll get several quick votes for this and turn out to be right several days later. Seriously, it's becoming as much of a trend as my being a Roleblocker on Idle.)

[Rysto]

There was this old game a while ago, I think an SDMB game but it may have been on Idle, where someone said "this Day was a disaster" after a bunch of power role claims.
This was fluiddruid's "The Mob is Recruiting" game, played here at the SDMB.

[Drain Bead]

Thanks. They all blur together after a while. Gonna have to find that one--I think it's the one I subbed into as a Cop.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

See, Drain Bead, you've seen scum slips (how do you pronounce your name in your head, by the way? do you maintain the rhyme scheme or what? this troubles me.)!

Anyway, I was in the middle of working on a post making the same basic argument but I keep getting pulled away.

The part of the post that bothers me, but for much the same reason, is

Between Red Skeezix and Chipacabra I honestly don't know: I find them both highly suspicious, and honestly if one of them were to be lynched on day 1 I would still keep an eye on the next one on day 2, because I think they've both shown cracks, and neither has done a sufficient job of convincing me of their guilt or innocence.

So we've got "never confident... on small evidence" to open the post, followed eventually by a "both highly suspicious." Two different outs.

As far as the numbers go, I'm far more comfortable backing the notion that there's a scum player pumping up both sides of a town-vs.-town debacle than the idea that there are two good scum candidates presenting their necks unilaterally on day one. The "both sides look scummy; if I'm wrong about the first one it'll have to be the second one" argument is one that seems vastly more likely to cook two townies than to serve as a day one code-breaker.

For the record, I do agree in large part with Omi no Kami's assessment of Chip's play style to this point. But I don't agree about the conclusion.

We're now officially into voting season, I think, so I'll get on record.
Vote Omi no Kami

[Omi no Kami]

This kind of language really gets on my nerves. To me it reads like someone who knows that they're going to be following it up by analyzing and voting for the behavior of someone who is townie. There was this old game a while ago, I think an SDMB game but it may have been on Idle, where someone said "this Day was a disaster" after a bunch of power role claims...but before the actual lynch occurred. Had the lynchee been Scum, the Day would not have been all that bad...so it sure seemed like that person knew they were about to lynch a Town player. It's those kind of slips that are the only ones I think are more likely to be made by a Scum player than a Townie. When I'm Scum, I frequently whine and hem and haw about how much Day One sucks, usually because I know I am joining a bandwagon on a Townie. And yeah, Day One might suck, but then again it might not. And Town shouldn't know how much it's sucking until it's over.

As I said earlier, the Chip vs. Skeezix argument doesn't really draw me in on either side, but this is enough for me to place a vote.

vote Omi no Kami

(And if past history in SDMB games are any indication, I'll get several quick votes for this and turn out to be right several days later. Seriously, it's becoming as much of a trend as my being a Roleblocker on Idle.)

I don't see the connection between the case you're citing and my complaint: I hate voting on day one because I've never, to my recollection, had a strong opinion about any of the players. I assume that's frequently the case for everyone else as well, but it does honestly irritate me to pick at minutiae and build mountains out of molehills just to see who jumps and who shrugs it off.

As far as I can recall, and as you've summarized, the case you're talking about involved a player revealed (in large part due to his slipup) to be Scum by making that before the lynchee's affiliation was revealed.

I prefaced my analysis because a) it happened to be true, and b) I was worried that someone might try to attack me by picking apart a flaw in my analysis and then claiming that, as I had made such a big deal out of a minor point, I must have had some ulterior motive for wanting that particular player lynched-no truly objective player would reach those conclusions, yadda yadda yadda. By clarifying that I didn't have a strong feeling or evidence toward any one player, and was simply coming up with the best conclusion I could based on the evidence and my own personal feelings, I hoped to head off that sort of thing pre-emptively.

So I guess I'm just wondering where you see my decision to vote for Chip on the basis that among the early suspicious players he's been the most disruptive to Town discussion even remotely resembling a Scum slipup indicating foreknowledge of his candidate's allegiance.

[Omi no Kami]

As far as the numbers go, I'm far more comfortable backing the notion that there's a scum player pumping up both sides of a town-vs.-town debacle than the idea that there are two good scum candidates presenting their necks unilaterally on day one. The "both sides look scummy; if I'm wrong about the first one it'll have to be the second one" argument is one that seems vastly more likely to cook two townies than to serve as a day one code-breaker.

I actually agree with you on this one, and I'm much happier to have you voting for me that Drain. For my part I can't do much beyond justify my argument from my own point of view, and if I survive, wait to see if Chip and Red's affiliation. For my own part, the reason I brought up continuing to suspect Red is that I think he has a better chance of being Scum than Chip does: his reaction was way too strong when Chip voted for him, and while it was possibly the reaction of an inexperienced townie (sorry Red, I don't know how much experience you have in the game), it's generally better not to presume innocence.

However, in spite of that he wasn't being nearly as disruptive or single-minded in selling his own argument, and since Chip's single-mindedness bothered me almost as much as Red's flinch, I felt that given how much time and focus he was sucking into his own issue, he was the greater potential threat.

I can't say anything about the provisios you're (rightly) pointing out in my voting post, though: I'm naturally a very cautious speaker IRL and when writing, and I tend to fairly punctuate anything I write with qualifiers to make sure I'm not claiming something that I can't back up. I can make an effort to quit it for the purposes of the game, but my non-mafia board history supports this and there's really nothing I can do about it beyond making a point of being more clear-cut in my statements here.

[Chipacabra]

Jeez, I go to the bed for the night, and stuff gets real.

Lots to say, so I'm going to try to organize my thoughts a bit.

1) The muggle joke was purely a joke about soccer, yes.

2) I do think I've been pretty open with my plan from the beginning, and have been consistent in how I applied it.

3) It looks like the biggest blow to my credibility is Peeker. :/ Thanks a lot, hehe.

4) The arguments that people are making that I sound scum seem... strange to me. Like, maybe I'm just thinking about this game differently, but I think my actions wouldn't be a very good idea for a scum player.

5) I'm sorry if I've been acting in a 'hey follow me' sort of way. It just seemed to me that if my ping vote idea was going to work, it had to happen very early in the day, when there's still plenty of time to switch to the actual scum hunt later in the day. Which is where I'm at now.

6) You can't say that my plan hasn't been effective, even if you don't agree with it. :D Look at all the lovely arguing it's caused! My hope is that even if this particular day gets screwed up, it will leave behind some threads for town to unravel.

7) I'm a little disappointed with Omi's vote logic. You suspect Red more than me, but vote me because I'm more disruptive? That seems backward. I can't decide if it's suspicious or just short sighted, though. :/

8) Why do people keep saying that an early day 1 vote needs to have anything supporting it? That just makes no sense to me.

9) Guiri: It didn't seem like tilt, Freudian, and Meeko responded in any unusual way. Red's response seemed unusual. Was your read different? How so?

10) Where is Storyteller?

11) For the record, this is my first forum game. All of my other games have been live. I am watching the Malazan game, but did not participate. I have watched a few games here, so I am aware that the metagame is somewhat poisoned. :D

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(3): Red Skeezix, Meeko, Ominokami

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto

Ominokami(2): DrainBead, JimmyChitwood


This Day ends in 21 Hours.

[Drain Bead]

For my own part, the reason I brought up continuing to suspect Red is that I think he has a better chance of being Scum than Chip does: his reaction was way too strong when Chip voted for him, and while it was possibly the reaction of an inexperienced townie (sorry Red, I don't know how much experience you have in the game), it's generally better not to presume innocence.

However, in spite of that he wasn't being nearly as disruptive or single-minded in selling his own argument, and since Chip's single-mindedness bothered me almost as much as Red's flinch, I felt that given how much time and focus he was sucking into his own issue, he was the greater potential threat.

Whoa whoa whoa, hold the phone.

This isn't Malazan! (http://www.idlemafia.com/index.cgi?board=ada) The greater potential threat is the one who "has a better chance of being Scum," not the person whose policy or gameplay style you disagree with! If you think Red has a better chance of being Scum, then you should be voting for him. I am not getting your reasoning here at all.

I'll admit my vote was as much on hunch as anything else, but the above quote has given me yet another reason to vote for you. I feel like I must be missing something, because that's maybe one of the more blatantly scummy comments I've seen in all my time of playing Mafia.

[Jimmy Chitwood]

6) You can't say that my plan hasn't been effective, even if you don't agree with it. :D Look at all the lovely arguing it's caused! My hope is that even if this particular day gets screwed up, it will leave behind some threads for town to unravel.

Effective toward what goal? If a bunch of people are arguing about something irrelevant to distinguishing between town players and scum players, a possibility you're allowing for, it seems, how are you so confident about your "plan's" effectiveness? Sometimes - often - noise is noise.

8) Why do people keep saying that an early day 1 vote needs to have anything supporting it? That just makes no sense to me.

What I see is a few players who have suggested that you're shooting your own plan in the foot by actually saying "I'm voting for X for no reason." Which is probably true - for an effort designed purportedly to get people to flinch, you don't do yourself any favors by disclaiming any actual suspicion. Which gets back to the point above - why should anybody else believe you've been effective by voting near-randomly?

Omi: I hear you and I hear the point that it isn't necessarily an argument you're going to be able to substantiate. I especially agree that couching an argument in cautious language is fairly normal and not a great point to hang my hat on. I do it all the time myself. I don't know what to do with my vote but I don't want to seem like I ignored your response.

[ShadowFacts]

For my own part, the reason I brought up continuing to suspect Red is that I think he has a better chance of being Scum than Chip does: his reaction was way too strong when Chip voted for him, and while it was possibly the reaction of an inexperienced townie (sorry Red, I don't know how much experience you have in the game), it's generally better not to presume innocence.

However, in spite of that he wasn't being nearly as disruptive or single-minded in selling his own argument, and since Chip's single-mindedness bothered me almost as much as Red's flinch, I felt that given how much time and focus he was sucking into his own issue, he was the greater potential threat.


Whoa whoa whoa, hold the phone.

This isn't Malazan! (http://www.idlemafia.com/index.cgi?board=ada) The greater potential threat is the one who "has a better chance of being Scum," not the person whose policy or gameplay style you disagree with! If you think Red has a better chance of being Scum, then you should be voting for him. I am not getting your reasoning here at all.


Yes, please explain further about your position here, Omi. This is so freaking blatant that I'm not sure I'm reading "scum," but on the surface this seems pretty damn anti-town.

[One And Only Wanderers]

Moving on, we have the Red Skeezix/Chipacabra dustup. Red got way too bent out of shape over the initial accusation, especially considering that it came on the first day. His immediate, subsequent posts gave me the feeling that he was "scrambling" a bit to establish a front of innocence, and even though he since seems to have evened out, the fact that his initial reaction was so out of whack with that of the other players is a huge, blaring sign.



OK Huge blaring sign on Red. I hear ya


Chipacabra, on the other hand, just annoys me-his initial voting behavior was not atypical of day 1 players, openly voting to provoke a response, but the way he admitted that he was voting without having a clear suspicion in mind irks me: if you vote for someone, you need to be willing to back that vote up, and his comments sounded to me like he was trying to get a free pass- vote for people to see what happens, but since you've already admitted that you don't have a logical basis for voting beyond your general strategy, if the person you vote for ends up being a townie you can expect yourself to be held blameless. I think this entirely defeats the purpose of voting, as randomly harassing players might help find scum, but it makes it really difficult for us to examine YOUR voting record and reach any conclusion about your behavior and possible undisclosed alliances from it.



Ok Chipacabra annoys you and you think he is increasing the noise to signal ratio



Between Red Skeezix and Chipacabra I honestly don't know: I find them both highly suspicious, and honestly if one of them were to be lynched on day 1 I would still keep an eye on the next one on day 2, because I think they've both shown cracks, and neither has done a sufficient job of convincing me of their guilt or innocence.

However, at this time I think Chipacabra has been more detrimental to overall progress: he's dominated the group's attention with the disclaimer-filled rapid-fire voting, and frankly I'm so sick of hearing him re-hash the same points without progress in either direction that my eyes practically glaze over whenever I log on to find another long wall of quotations and text. Both he and Red look shady, but at this point I think Chipacabra has done a lot more to hurt the Town's effort: he's dominated a lot of the day's discussion, and in doing so prevented us from hearing (and evaluating) more from a greater range of players.

Because of that, I'm going to
Vote Chipacabra
Off the boarding school


No no no you d'int

anti-town <> scum. You have said that you have a huge blaring sign (presumably of scumminess) on Red, yet you are voting Chipa for anti-town (noise) reasons.

suspected scum > suspected anti-town, as anti town can be scum OR can be bad town play.


vote Omi no Kami

[One And Only Wanderers]

And just to expound a bit more, I see it as you trying to have the best of both worlds. If Red comes up scum you can say "look, look I raised suspicions as early as day one", whilst at the same time not voting him and trying to kill off a (if my suspicions are correct) town player.

[GuiriEnEspaña]

9) Guiri: It didn't seem like tilt, Freudian, and Meeko responded in any unusual way. Red's response seemed unusual. Was your read different? How so?
You used the word "flinched". As you cannot flinch on a message board, I interpreted this as "reacted", not "responded in an unusual way". Several players reacted but you focused on only one of them. Your interpretation explains your actions.

@ Omi no Kami, I don't understand your vote reasoning either. You're voting a player whose playstyle is bothering you over another player who you think has a better chance of being scum? How will that approach help Town win the game? We win when the scum are dead, not when disruptive players are dead.

Vote Omi no Kami

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(3): Red Skeezix, Meeko, Ominokami

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto

Ominokami(4): DrainBead, JimmyChitwood, Oneandonly, Guiri

3 hours and 45 minutes until the end of the Day.

[Little Plastic Ninja]

As far as the numbers go, I'm far more comfortable backing the notion that there's a scum player pumping up both sides of a town-vs.-town debacle than the idea that there are two good scum candidates presenting their necks unilaterally on day one. The "both sides look scummy; if I'm wrong about the first one it'll have to be the second one" argument is one that seems vastly more likely to cook two townies than to serve as a day one code-breaker.

This is more or less where I am, inasmuch as any of this makes sense. Something's wrong here. That which I cannot understand gets Stupefied and tied up by its ankles to interrogate further.

Vote Omi no Kami

[ShadowFacts]

I've got a meeting from 10-12 today (and every Thursday), so I'm never going to be around at the very end of a Day, which sucks. So, this is going to be my last post before the end of toDay, and I suspect it will be a bit controversial, and I'm sorry I won't be back to explain/defend it. Anyway...

This run on Omi No Kami is giving me serious deja vu. I've seen it before: a player says something really stupid, lots of people jump on that player shouting "OMG Scum!," they get lynched, and it turns out they were Town. [Note for clarity: I am NOT saying that Omi No Kami is Town - I am explaining something I've seen in previous games]. Everyone left alive shrugs and says "But they said X - how could we not vote for them????" And we get a dead townie and learn little about those who voted for him/her. Does this sound familiar to anyone else?

Is there anything we can do to shake up this familiar story? Here's why we should consider it: this is exactly the kind of situation I tried to get in on with my vote when I have played as scum. It's the perfect vote hiding place. IF Omi is Town, then I can almost guarantee that there is one or more scum voting for him/her (?) already. The safe thing to do, of course, is just to let the day take its course and if Omi gets lynched and turns up Town, take a hard look at those who voted for him/her. But the deniability I talked about above makes that unlikely to yield any real fruit. A more out-of-the-box, shake things up idea would be to spend the last 3 hours of the game looking at the Omi voters hard and voting for one of them instead. At this moment, (again assuming Omi is Town for a second) I would say there is a 20-40% chance of hitting scum in that group just on random chance alone, and that ain't bad for Day One.

OK, that's all I have time for right now. I'm sure I'll take some flak for this idea, but I'm tossing it out there, and I hope Town will take it seriously and think hard about it. Maybe it's a terrible idea, but maybe, just maybe, I'm a genius :D

[One And Only Wanderers]

I have stated the reasons for my vote and am happy to be accountable if things go pear shaped. I think "me too" votes, or votes light on reasoning are the problem. Omi's posting of a long thought out post, where they then ignored the player they themselves pciked as scummy to vote for a player they viewed as a noise generator was most odd, and I am not surprised it has garnished votes.

[One And Only Wanderers]

And I think your idea of scrutinising Omi voters tomorrow if Omi turns out town is reasonable, but at this point I am happy with an Omi lynch due to the data that will be generated, especially if Omi flips scum.

I do not think a random lynching of one of the Omi pack today is useful. The utility of such relies entirely on your surmise of Omi being town. If omi is scum then the likelihood for scum to be in omn the vote changes surely?

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(3): Red Skeezix, Meeko, Ominokami

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto

Ominokami(5): DrainBead, JimmyChitwood, Oneandonly, Guiri, Littleplastic

A little under 2 hours remain in Day One.

[Zeriel]

Whoa whoa whoa, hold the phone.

This isn't Malazan! (http://www.idlemafia.com/index.cgi?board=ada) The greater potential threat is the one who "has a better chance of being Scum," not the person whose policy or gameplay style you disagree with! If you think Red has a better chance of being Scum, then you should be voting for him. I am not getting your reasoning here at all.

I'll admit my vote was as much on hunch as anything else, but the above quote has given me yet another reason to vote for you. I feel like I must be missing something, because that's maybe one of the more blatantly scummy comments I've seen in all my time of playing Mafia.

I disagree with this. Is it not true that scum have often tried to hide behind policy votes? Is it not true that scum have lent their support to townie plans that were subtly anti-town? While I will ring the "don't vote based on strategy disagreement" bell, there is a lot of room to say "no, that plan is pro-scum, and so are you." There's equally a lot of room to say "I think X has done more objectively scummy things, but Y's scumminess is subtle and has to do with their bad plans and anti-town play, making them a greater threat."

Despite this, I am not voting for you. I think Oni's desultory comments speak towards a fundamentally bad-for-town attitude (that is, that town can't win until the scum hands us something to win with).

vote Oni No Kami

[Zeriel]

NETA: "Despite this, I am not voting for you, becuase I believe we ARE just having a strategy disagreement."

[tiltawhirl]

I haven't jumped on the Omi bandwagon because the principal reason for voting for him is that he voted on the player who he saw as being the least pro-town and not for the player that he thought most likely to be scum. It seems that most of those voting for him are voting against him for anti-town play, not for suspecting him of being scum.

If Omi turns up town as I think he will, the Omi bandwagon deserves a good hard look next Day.

[Mahaloth]

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(3): Red Skeezix, Meeko, Ominokami

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto

Ominokami(6): DrainBead, JimmyChitwood, Oneandonly, Guiri, Littleplastic, Zeriel

About 37 minutes left in Day One.

[Red Skeezix]

@Shadowfacts:

While I think your suggestion is an intriguing one, I do not think trying to squeeze a discussion into the space of a few hours would be anything other than a clusterfuck. That said, I think there will be much to profit from analyzing how this bandwagon formed, especially in the area of well-reasoned cases vs me-too votes.

@The 1/3rd of the players who haven't bothered to vote, wtf!?! This is ridiculous. You can't all be scum. What reason could you possibly all have for not voting?

[Mahaloth]

Day ends at Noon, though I'm cleaning a mess in the basement and may write up the color for it a bit late. Just a few minutes, though.

[Mahaloth]

Final Vote Count:

Vote Count:

Chipacabra(3): Red Skeezix, Meeko, Ominokami

Red Skeezix(2): ShadowFacts, Chipacabra

Freudian(1): Rysto

Ominokami(6): DrainBead, JimmyChitwood, Oneandonly, Guiri, Littleplastic, Zeriel


Just a moment, please.

[Mahaloth]

As the Day began, the Order of the Phoenix set out to discover who the Death Eaters were that had hidden themselves within them.

But then, an odd quiet set about the Order. Some people made some suggestions and others nodded in agreement or shook in disagreement, but on the whole, the Order of the Phoenix was quiet and reserved.

“Who should we kill? Is there any way to know?” said one.

Everyone looked at their feet, puttered around, and mumbled thoughts that could barely be heard.

“I have an idea,” said Chipacabra.

“Then I think you are a Death Eater,” responded a few wizards.

Ominokami stepped forward and said, “I also think Chip is a Death Eater.”

“Oh really?” cried some other wizards. “Then,” they said, “you must be the true Death Eater!”

A small group began to encircle Ominokami.

“Wait! No!” he cried.

More voices from other wizards began to join the accusation on Ominokami. Wands began to be raised, while one wizard took Ominokami’s wand from him.

“Then it’s decided,” said one wizard.

The Order of the Phoenix pointed their wands at Ominokami and together, they cried out:

“Avada Kadavra!”

Green light shot quickly out of the wands of the Order of the Phoenix members.

And Ominokami was instantly dead.

But who was he really?

As they stared at Ominokami….he began to morph. His true form was revealed.

And they recognized him.

Ominokami was Antonin Dolohov, a Death Eater.


“Well,” said one wizard, “we definitely know they are among us.”

"Yeah," replied another, "But I doubt we'll get that lucky again."

Several wizards just hung their heads in shame....not saying anything.


It is now Night One.

Day Two will begin on Saturday at 12:00 Noon Eastern.As the Day began, the Order of the Phoenix set out to discover who the Death Eaters were that had hidden themselves within them.

But then, an odd quiet set about the Order. Some people made some suggestions and others nodded in agreement or shook in disagreement, but on the whole, the Order of the Phoenix was quiet and reserved.

“Who should we kill? Is there any way to know?” said one.

Everyone looked at their feet, puttered around, and mumbled thoughts that could barely be heard.

“I have an idea,” said Chipacabra.

“Then I think you are a Death Eater,” responded a few wizards.

Ominokami stepped forward and said, “I also think Chip is a Death Eater.”

“Oh really?” cried some other wizards. “Then,” they said, “you must be the true Death Eater!”

A small group began to encircle Ominokami.

“Wait! No!” he cried.

More voices from other wizards began to join the accusation on Ominokami. Wands began to be raised, while one wizard took Ominokami’s wand from him.

“Then it’s decided,” said one wizard.

The Order of the Phoenix pointed their wands at Ominokami and together, they cried out:

“Avada Kadavra!”

Green light shot quickly out of the wands of the Order of the Phoenix members.

And Ominokami was instantly dead.

But who was he really?

As they stared at Ominokami….he began to morph. His true form was revealed.

And they recognized him.

Ominokami was Antonin Dolohov, a Death Eater.


“Well,” said one wizard, “we definitely know they are among us.”


It is now Night One.

Day Two will begin on Saturday at 12:00 Noon Eastern.

[USCDiver]

A scum so nice, they killed him twice!

[Mahaloth]

A scum so nice, they killed him twice!

Yeah, that is weird.

My bad, folks! :)

[Tom Scud]

Someone's got a malfunctioning Time-winder.

[Mahaloth]

I thought it looked a bit long for color.

:smack:

[Rysto]

Nice one, guys! Sorry that I missed the end of the Day -- I flew to my parents yesterday and fell asleep just after supper.

Someone's got a malfunctioning Time-winder.

[Rysto]

NETA: I meant to say, that's a Time-Turner.

[ShadowFacts]

Maybe it's a terrible idea, but maybe, just maybe, I'm a genius :D

Guess that's settled :smack:

[GuiriEnEspaña]

Yes!!!

Is the bar open?

[One And Only Wanderers]

Sweet. Rarely happens day one. Nice when it does. Eat hot death, Death Eater!

[Little Plastic Ninja]

Wow! High five!

[Jimmy Chitwood]

In your face Dolohov, you Lupin killer.

But what's up with the unforgivable curse? Aren't all our souls for shit now?

[Drain Bead]

Hot Damn! I am totally impressed with myself now. ;)

Who's tending bar?

[Little Plastic Ninja]

Firewhiskeys all around!

[Zeriel]

In your face Dolohov, you Lupin killer.

But what's up with the unforgivable curse? Aren't all our souls for shit now?

I thought you were allows to use an unforgivable in wartime. At least the Avada.

Not that I'm comfortable with it.

What I WOULD be comfortable with is some firewhiskey.

[Little Plastic Ninja]

Yeah, Unforgivables are still bad.

Sectumsempra isn't an Unforgivable last I checked, though, which always seemed weird to me: as far as I can tell the AK is a very quick death whereas every other way to kill people is, well, unpleasant. :eek:

[Mahaloth]

Upon review, I have noticed that I missed an "edit" during Day One.

If I'd seen it, I would have issued the only warning of the game. So, I'll do that now:

Here is the only warning on "editing" in the entire game.

DO NOT EDIT POSTS. EVEN IF I DON'T IMMEDIATELY NOTICE ANOTHER ONE, I WILL GO BACK AND MOD KILL YOU AS SOON AS I DO.

[Mahaloth]

Is the bar open?

I could use a butterbeer.

[One And Only Wanderers]

*passes over a pint of John Smith's with a pat of Lurpak in it*

...

...


What? ;)

[ColdPhoenix]

Apologies all for my non-participation, my wife went into hospital on Monday and I'm now a dad! Earlier than I expected and I now suspect I won't have much time to commmit to the game. It would be best if a sub replaces me.

I was looking forward to playing but can't say that I'm upset to be leaving it under the circumstances!

[One And Only Wanderers]

Apologies all for my non-participation, my wife went into hospital on Monday and I'm now a dad! Earlier than I expected and I now suspect I won't have much time to commmit to the game. It would be best if a sub replaces me.

I was looking forward to playing but can't say that I'm upset to be leaving it under the circumstances!

Get your priorities straight man!

Or alternatively


Congratulations! All the best with your new addition to the family! Hope you didn't enjoy sleep all that much......