Yeah, figured I’d start one, mainly because of this statement:
Why!? Why!? Why!?
I don’t get this at all. I’ve never understood it. The miller should not claim by some specific time frame. If the miller gets investigated, the miller should accept they are going to be lynched and the detective wasted an investigation. If the miller never gets investigated, well, they’re pretty much a vanilla anyway. (Unless it’s the rare miller with a power, who also shouldn’t claim unless forced to to avoid lynch, and then expect to by lynched unless your power is undeniably pro-town and can be proven as such.)
But a miller who claims is typically an automatic mislynch to town. Because town typically cannot allow a miller to live. Because to do so give scum a get-out-of-lynch free card.
If you claim miller, you pretty much have to be lynched, barring unique circumstances (cf. peeker’s character in Skrull Planet on Idle’s board, who had a power and was up for lynch so he full claimed and his power claim caused town to give him a short leash).
So don’t do it without a damn good reason. And merely being a miller is not a damn good reason.
A Miller who claims in day 1 is saying “Here oh Mafia, have a free mislynch.” By claiming they force the mislynch; by not claiming they increase the target number for the Mafia to win.
There are two other reasons to not claim. Firstly, with a guaranteed lynch the amount of discussion is drastically reduced; if the guaranteed lynch is on Day 1 then there will be very much less data to look back on and mine for discrepancies with later Days. Secondly, the Miller might never be investigated.
Peeker was right to claim in Skrull Planet, not because he was a Miller but because he was a leading contender for the drop. If he hadn’t also been a Doc-type, he’d probably have been lynched.
I don’t feel this is something to be proud of. Also, it means anyone playing with him this game and in future games is going to be a lot tougher on him. Tsk, tsk.
Because a Miller (traditional miller, not a miller with powers) must be lynched. If the Miller could somehow arrange to be nightkilled, that would be better, but since Town has no control over these things, an early miller claim is optimal for the following reasons:
(1) An investigation of a Miller is a waste of resources.
(2) A Detective investigating a Miller will be tempted to claim based on false information. “Hey, look I found us a scum to lynch” “ooops, no I didn’t.”
(3) By claiming, the Miller essentially gives the Town a free investigation. Everyone knows that an investigation of the claimant will yield “scum.” The same result as would have happened if the Detective investigated the miller.
That said, Miller roles suck.
Correct. Miller roles suck.
It all boils down to the fact that Miller roles suck.
Claiming and getting lynched ASAP is still sucky, but ever so slightly less sucky.
So I’ve read the thread. Wow. That was unexpected.
The Name Claim mumbo jumbo is happening again. I’m typically against early claims, but I’m starting to hope for a mass claim on Day One just to get it done and over with. Maybe if we do one and it is utterly disastrous we can stop talking about it. And if it is successful, then maybe we will have more to discuss.
Hm. I’m not sure that eliminating the chance of a miller being investigated is worth a a guaranteed mislynch. It’s just as likely that the miller will be killed as he will be investigating, assuming that there’s only a scum night kill out there. If there are any other kills happening that just argues more in favour of the miller not claiming.
Ideally I guess the Miller would claim on Day 1 and a Vig would take him out Night 1. This eliminates the possibility of the Vig killing a power role and the chance that an investigator will waste his investigation and potentially outing himself.
So the ideal way to play this role is to die on Night 1. Yep, Miller roles suck.
I think it would fun to have a game where the Mod gives out every player’s ‘Name’ at the beginning. Obviously there would have to be no correlation between name and alignment, but it would be fun to see what the players would do with that information. There would undoubtedly be a lot of WIFOM.
That is a valid argument. I’m pro-killing the Miller right away because I’m generally anti-Miller. I also feel that game balance dictates the Miller as a given mis-lynch. I stated the reasons because Hoopy asked for them. In other words, it isn’t 100% clear cut to kill the miller right away but there are valid and reasonable arguments for killing the miller right away.
In Random Mafia, the players name claimed on Day One. They also name claimed really fast and without much argument.
(1) In that situation the Doctor and Detective had identifiable names. Had they name claimed truthfully, they would be de facto power claiming.
(2) Both lied.
(3) An unintended side-effect was that all Masons knew each others game names, but not usernames. As such, the mass name claim outed all Mason to each other and only to each other. This was the pro-town effect of the mass name claim.
So, in truth, a mass name claim, in the one instance that I recall happening, did end up pro-Town. But the town powers needed to lie.
(4) The ‘canon’ was drawn from random people at my whim. Lies were unlikely to overlap with anyone else in the game. I think in Mahaloth’s game, making up an identity is probably a bit harder.
Also, the Godfather made a typo in his claim post that would have been hard to explain as anything but an artefact of editing. But no one noticed it except his fellow scum.
I’m shocked at the train on ushi. I think to a large extent this is a lynch of ‘someone I don’t care for.’ rather than ‘I think he’s scum.’ We’ve done that before, back on idle’s board. I think it was a friend of JSexton and his style rubbed people the wrong way. He was lynched quickly.
I have the same opinion as storyteller. ushi is unlikely to be scum. It is possible that ushi is not “new” and is playing a clever ruse, but I find this scenario unlikely. It is also possible that scum can talk during the day and ushi was directed to act the way he is, but I find that highly unlikely. While possible, I find it simply improbable, so much so that the only explanation left is ushi is Town. As scum, a new player isn’t going to be nearly as abrasive as ushi has been. Town players are trying to find scum, which is what ushi has done (abrasively, but still). Scum players are trying to not get lynched, which ushi has NOT DONE.
Anyway, I’ll be shocked if ushi is scum. Too bad storyteller is so busy. He would likely articulate ushi’s probable alignment in a clear enough manner to have an effect.
Ed, I’m less certain of. The scenario that keeps popping up in my head is that Ed is scum and ushi is Town. Before ushi’s outburst, Ed had clearly been back-pedaling on ushi. I think Ed realized that he was being overly familiar with a total stranger. While the rest of us wouldn’t think twice about Ed’s comments, they were out of line when talking to a new player. Ed realized this and his posts indicate contrition on his part, which I was happy to see. Too bad ushi didn’t see those parts. We might have avoided the unpleasantness.
Anyway, if I assume ushi is Town then I find it more likely that Ed would be contrite about his attitude toward ushi if Ed was scum. As town, I think Ed would be less likely to be contrite towards ushi.
So that’s my early call.
I also think Cookies is scum. I can’t articulate why, but in her post before Chronos’s vote I found it off in some way.
On a metagamey front, Ed has recently been scum in two games where the scum lost, badly (and at least once through no fault of their own); he’d be more likely (IMO) to withdraw for “oh no here we go again” reasons if he was scum.