# Lord of the Rings Mafia **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [August 10, 2010, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867 "2010-08-10T19:56:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 98
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1941 "2010-08-30T15:43:20Z")
Catching up, but I want to carry over my vote(s) from YesterDay. **unvote** **vote Meeko** , for fishing and for voting me for refusing to be fished. vote peekercpa, for anti-town post spamming. vote MHaye, for implicitly referring to out-of-thread communications. ---
**Author:** ![peekercpa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8baadc/32.png) [@peekercpa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peekercpa)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1942 "2010-08-30T15:47:09Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > And I guess by walking myself through that, I am willing to put my money where my mouth is and NOT vote for you. I agree with **peeker** ’s most recent analysis of the situation. > > Also, **peeker** , I didn’t say WHO would be fucking you… well if it’s not you i am not paying for squat. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1943 "2010-08-30T15:47:15Z")
Quoth **Drain Bead** : > [@](#): > > People generally say that a Cop’s job isn’t so much to find Scum as it is to confirm Town. At middle and endgame especially, confirmed Town is worth as much if not more than outed Scum. It makes it harder for Scum to hide and makes them have to do more killing to win. Investigating other Town power roles is somewhat pointless–they can, in many instances, self-confirm. Vanillas cannot, and finding a potential pool of vanillas to report back about later is a boon, not a drawback. Had all the power roles figured out what ed was doing and remained silent, ed could potentially be the Town MVP at this point (to borrow from Meeko). And I guess that’s the source of my biggest issue with an ed lynch–we’re blaming him for not being able to predict the actions of others. It sounds like you’re arguing here that it would have been good for Town for everyone to just come out and say whether they were a power role on Day 1, to give the Detective a nice pool of vanillas to investigate. In other words, fishing on a massive scale. Which I know you see the drawbacks of, since you’ve just now argued against fishing. And I still maintain that it’s not possible to fish **Pleonast**. Asking him what his power is is not doing the Scum’s work for them; telling the Scum that he has a power role is what’s doing their work for them. Once the Scum know he’s a power role, they know all they need to know about him. If he were to declare that he’s the Detective, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. If he were to declare that he’s the Vigilante, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. If he were to declare that his death would cause an extra Night, like with Harry Potter, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. No matter what his role is, the Scum reaction would be the same, which means that Scum don’t really care what his role is. We Townies, though, might reasonably react in very different ways based on what his role is: For instance, if he were Detective, we’d want to know whom he investigated, and what they came up with. And no matter what he claimed, we’d be able to try to figure out if it’s consistent. So it does help Town for him to finish his claim. ---
**Author:** ![peekercpa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8baadc/32.png) [@peekercpa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peekercpa)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1944 "2010-08-30T15:54:09Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Catching up, but I want to carry over my vote(s) from YesterDay. > **unvote** > **vote Meeko** , for fishing and for voting me for refusing to be fished. > vote peekercpa, for anti-town post spamming. > vote MHaye, for implicitly referring to out-of-thread communications. ok, isn’t the first time i have been in your grill **pleo** and hopefully will not be the last. you like to come out with these unprovoked claims early on. i think that anti town. especially the way you address them. **pleo** i am a power role so please don’t trouble me with any questions or explanations. and yeh, i like a lot of discussion. seems like information derives from that activity. do i go overboard, sure. but has already been mentioned i am kind of sitting home following this by the minute. ok, **pleo** quick question. in harry potter do you think the lack of discussion helped town or helped scum? and you can of course be goldilocks and say, too little, too much, or just right. and i assume you are the arbiter of those threshholds. could you kind of let the rest of us know what they are. ---
**Author:** ![Drain\_Bead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@Drain\_Bead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drain_Bead)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1945 "2010-08-30T16:01:08Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Quoth **Drain Bead** : > > > [@](#): > > > > People generally say that a Cop’s job isn’t so much to find Scum as it is to confirm Town. At middle and endgame especially, confirmed Town is worth as much if not more than outed Scum. It makes it harder for Scum to hide and makes them have to do more killing to win. Investigating other Town power roles is somewhat pointless–they can, in many instances, self-confirm. Vanillas cannot, and finding a potential pool of vanillas to report back about later is a boon, not a drawback. Had all the power roles figured out what ed was doing and remained silent, ed could potentially be the Town MVP at this point (to borrow from Meeko). And I guess that’s the source of my biggest issue with an ed lynch–we’re blaming him for not being able to predict the actions of others. > > It sounds like you’re arguing here that it would have been good for Town for everyone to just come out and say whether they were a power role on Day 1, to give the Detective a nice pool of vanillas to investigate. In other words, fishing on a massive scale. Which I know you see the drawbacks of, since you’ve just now argued against fishing. > > And I still maintain that it’s not possible to fish **Pleonast**. Asking him what his power is is not doing the Scum’s work for them; telling the Scum that he has a power role is what’s doing their work for them. Once the Scum know he’s a power role, they know all they need to know about him. If he were to declare that he’s the Detective, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. If he were to declare that he’s the Vigilante, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. If he were to declare that his death would cause an extra Night, like with Harry Potter, what would Scum do? They’d kill him. No matter what his role is, the Scum reaction would be the same, which means that Scum don’t really care what his role is. We Townies, though, might reasonably react in very different ways based on what his role is: For instance, if he were Detective, we’d want to know whom he investigated, and what they came up with. And no matter what he claimed, we’d be able to try to figure out if it’s consistent. So it does help Town for him to finish his claim. 1. In my analysis, I was assuming that everything else regarding **ed** ’s handshake stayed the same except for **Gadarene** and **Telcontar** staying out of it. I suppose you’re right that we can’t make that assumption when looking at the base motivation of things, but as it stands now based on numbers, I don’t think EVERY vanilla shook with **ed** , just enough to potentially give us a nice pool of confirmed Town with maybe a Scum or two in the pile as well, depending on whether or not they had the vanilla PM. It’s not like the Scum can now go down the list of non-shakers and start hitting power roles left and right. I’d have to guess that there are about as many vanillas in the non-shakers as there are in the shakers. So I wasn’t saying that we should have all come out and said “Hey, I’m vanilla” or “I’m a power” on Day One, I was operating under the parameters of how it played itself out. 2. It’s a WIFOM game with **Pleo** and the Scum, provided he’s not one of them, in which case it becomes a WIFOM game with him and the Town. The Scum, if he’s not one, know he’s either a Town Power role, a vanilla, or perhaps a third party. If he’s vanilla, he’s painted himself into a corner by lying if forced to truly claim, but a NK of him by Scum assuming he’s a power role is a really good thing for Town. If he’s third party, he can bank on Town keeping him alive thinking he’s a power role and Scum keeping him alive thinking he’s trying to trick them (by either being vanilla, a Scotsman or Bomb, or back on Day One, perhaps a self-protecting Doc, although that option is almost certainly off the table now). Another option that I neglected to consider until I did my WoW was that he could be a Mason, which is how he a) is so sure that MHaye is Scum, and b) is so sure that he’s not going to be lynched by a Town pissed off at his claim, which is what happened the last time he tried this gambit, or so people tell me, but that’s not something that the Scum necessarily need to guard themselves against. All that having been said, there are valid reasons for the Scum to try to get more info out of him. If they find out that he’s all those roles you mentioned, yes, they kill him. If they find out that he’s a Bomb, or perhaps a Scotsman who knows who tried to kill him? Not so much. Thinking that **Pleo** has already given the Scum all the info that they need to know just shows a lack of creativity on your part. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1946 "2010-08-30T16:13:09Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It sounds like you’re arguing here that it would have been good for Town for everyone to just come out and say whether they were a power role on Day 1, to give the Detective a nice pool of vanillas to investigate. In other words, fishing on a massive scale. Which I know you see the drawbacks of, since you’ve just now argued against fishing. Well, that would be a good idea, actually. The reason it doesn’t work is that scum can easily pick off the power roles. (However, if your pool of confirmed vanillas is large enough, scum would still lose, so there you go.) I think what Drain Bead is actually saying is that if a town power role CLAIMS, it’s better for the cop to look elsewhere. The claimed role will have to prove itself soon enough so if the cop works on building a pool of semi-confirmed vanillas, (they won’t be confirmed until a godfather dies) rather than investigating the claimed power role, town will do better. ---
**Author:** ![Meeko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Meeko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meeko)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1947 "2010-08-30T16:28:53Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Confirm receipt of my role PM. I have a Townie power role. > > Trying to catch up everything. Don’t you guys ever sleep? \*\*Can someone WOW on one post? Let’s find out. \*\* This post comes in the middle of the handshake. It is post 175. Post 174 is a response to the handshake. 179 and 180 also comment on the handshake. **I think it is fair to state that Pleonast knows that a handshake is underway here.** Let’s examine how he navigates the handshake, or lack thereof. **Confirm receipt of my role PM.** If we pair this with his second line, we glean that he wants us to think he is already behind and or pressed for time. Hence, he only has enough time to hit and run with his first line. It could also explain (excuse?) the late timing. Did Pleonast have time to strategize his tactic? If he was Town, and was going to make to his move, would he have taken as much time? **I have a Townie power role.** This is kinda the entire post, isn’t? I mean if Pleonast is going to play, he is obviously confirming receipt, right? The second line is esentially OOG. I’m not going to look at the second line in depth. - I will just take two seconds here to mention that relative to the first line, it means very little. It could be a legit appeal on the basis of not having enough time. Time being a force that would affect all players equally, regardless of role. If you can’t play, your side doesn’t have your input. It would seem that lack of time hurts both sides equally. [Scum start off a few steps ahead, to be sure, but time halts additional scum progress just as much as it halts additional town progress.] **Townie** This is a decidedly casual term. **It is also devoid of Color.** Pleonast could have made the same play, indeed the same exact post in any other Mafia game. Would the context and content change if we were playing Cecil pond right now, for example? Perhaps Pleonast doesn’t have the information to make this post more LOTR specific.\*\* C.F. Southpark’s Critique of Family Guy.\*\* Generic and Interchangeable parts doesn’t make for one distinguished episode. If nothing has meaning [That is, unique and non generic], all is meaningless. **power role** Ed’s handshake was apparently trying to verify vanillas. He attempted this with offering a given number of letters in the role he is presenting. Someone who is presenting a role that is non-vanilla could not participate. [IIRC some comments state that this is what did some of our now deceased power roles in.] Pleonast has no part with the “math” or as I call it, the Go-fish game that Ed sets up. **Is this the play of a Town Pleonast?** Is Pleonast being smart enough to shut up and not comment, as to give himself away? **Is this the play of a Scum Pleonast?** Does Pleonast know that he can’t compete in this arena? Does he figure he can present a Power Role here, and dodge the question of the Math? \*\* Conclusions: \*\* \*\* WIFOM :\*\* Were Vanilla PMs supplied to scum? If they were, wouldn’t this negate the need to claim a Town Power role? If Vanilla PMs were not supplied to scum, wouldn’t that mean that the handshake worked? **AH**. But if the Vanilla pm’s were not given to scum, wouldn’t that force Pleonast to claim Town power role? But then again, if Pleonast is really Town Power, wouldn’t he have voted against Ed, on the basis that Ed himself was fishing? ---
**Author:** ![Meeko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Meeko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meeko)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1948 "2010-08-30T16:43:38Z")
**Let’s do this.** If this game were Haggle, there would be so many ways to play this. But alas, it is not. I can’t go sideways on top of sideways here. I can’t spout the truth for all to hear, then ask them to pay me to have that truth come as “Word of Mod”, and watch them as they realize I just made a profit on a confirmation that I told them the truth, 100%. Nope. I must be direct here. Town, **please consider the merits of coming in after me and doing likewise.** We apparently have lost power roles out of eagerness to play “Follow the Leader.” \*\* I’m Celeborn.\*\* **Pleonast** , what is your name? Damn, to vote for two people at once. **Unvote Ed.** \*\* Vote Pleonast. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1949 "2010-08-30T16:44:07Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I was afraid of that… He let slip a few times that he was a power role, but I didn’t want to point it out. This play is controversial as to whether its pro-town or not. My opinion is that the townie slips should be pointed out to everyone. Scum have many eyes (at least in the early game) and will share their catches. It’s unlikely that all of them will miss a slip, especially because scum are looking for them. So there’s a very low cost to the town to revealing a slip. And there’s potential gain: it gives other town roles the chance to react to the slip (that they may easily have missed). > [@](#): > > With that, it’s now time for me to back up my [hashcrumb](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=12798267#post12798267). The hash I originally posted was > > ```auto > > 093220ee6df5628413c40e71e086d5f0 > > ``` > > The original message I used to produce this hash, as can be verified by [any MD5 hash generator](http://www.miraclesalad.com/webtools/md5.php), was > > ```auto > > I am Eowyn; Gadarene is Aragorn > > ``` The hash checks out. It would be odd for this information to have been given to you at game start if you were scum, so I will consider you confirmed until the unconfirmed pool is eliminated. (Since there could be recruitment, if the unconfirmed pool is eliminated and the game is not over, this confirmation will become unuseful.) > [@Meeko](#): > > Ok Class, say this with me “ **assuming Ed is Town. Which, I’m not so sure about** ”. The problem is (barring extraordinary circumstances) any hypothetical that starts with “assuming **X** is Town” must end with “do not lynch”. Yes, your hypothetical allows for **Ed** to not be town, which is fine. But it also allows for **Ed** to be town–and your conclusion is still to lynch him. That’s another point of anti-town behavior on your part. > [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > I have misgivings about this **ed** lynch, although it’s seeming damn near inevitable. In fact, I’d guess we don’t have a Vig in this game, or if we do they’re seriously gimped, because otherwise I’d have guessed he wouldn’t have lived until morning. > … > All this is academic; I know he is going to swing toDay, and he’s probably Scum, my nagging inner voice aside. I’m just thinking that there might be a way that we can work what he did to our advantage. (Snipped for space.) This is the scummiest post I’ve seen in a while. Calling a player’s lynch an inevitable, saying the player should’ve been Vig’d, even saying they’re likely scum, but not even placing a vote on them. vote Drainbead, for the ultimate wishy-washy smudge post. (No this is not a live vote, both because I already have an outstanding vote and because it’s not bold. But I’ll switch my vote here anytime I feel it’s advantageous because I think **DrainBead** needs to be lynched.) > [@peekercpa](#): > > i want you to do mine next. Yep, not even denying that his profligate posting is anti-town. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ (Putting long response to **DrainBead** ’s questions in a separate post.) ---
**Author:** ![Meeko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Meeko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meeko)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1950 "2010-08-30T16:44:38Z")
NETA: **Unvote All** **Vote Pleonast** ---
**Author:** ![Meeko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Meeko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meeko)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1951 "2010-08-30T16:51:31Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > The problem is (barring extraordinary circumstances) any hypothetical that starts with “assuming **X** is Town” must end with “do not lynch”. Yes, your hypothetical allows for **Ed** to not be town, which is fine. But it also allows for **Ed** to be town–and your conclusion is still to lynch him. :eek: You mean, you guys don’t understand how Meeko plays Mafia? Why hasn’t this bit of information come to light before now? I am totally shocked by this revelation. **Pleonast:** You mean that you would keep the Town Vig Alive, if he has offed a town player every night? – any hypothetical that starts with “assuming **X** is Town” must end with “do not lynch”. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1952 "2010-08-30T16:56:58Z")
The only time I’ve ever seen it necessary to lynch a known town player was in a game on GB where a remorseful vig was outed and had killed a townie but scum redirected her kill from her to other players and was getting two NKs a night. If the town vig is town, at some point he or she should STOP vigging without a good idea of who might be scum, in that case. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1953 "2010-08-30T16:58:02Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > First off. If anything, **Pleonast** is damned consistent. I find a few things he did a bit disingenuous, though. He talks a lot in the peeker vs. ed thing about how peeker is the one who brought up semantics and is being a bit of a hypocrite for accusing ed of trying to use semantics to trip people up. But he’s just as likely to use semantics. For example, when people say that he’s refusing to answer questions about his role, he always says something like “I have answered, and just because you don’t like the answers I’ve given doesn’t change that fact.” But in analyzing his WoW, the only actual answers he’s given has been “I’m not going to answer any questions.” Which is AN answer, yes, but it’s not the answers that people are looking for, and he _knows_ that. To say that he’s answered questions people have asked about his role by answering the questions with “I’m not going to answer” is weaselly–it makes him look better by saying that he’s answered, but the answers he’s provided were not actual answers to the questions asked. (Which is not to say that I think he SHOULD, provided he’s an actual Town power role–I’m just pointing out a bit of hypocrisy.) I didn’t attack **peeker** for using semantics. I attacked him for accusing **Ed** of semantics while using them himself. That is, hypocrisy (or at least suspicious inattention) on the part of **peeker**. I have no problem with arguments based on semantics. We’re trying to find players who are lying either explicitly or implicitly or by omission. Clues like specific word choices can be important. My argument against **MHaye** is borderline semantics. > [@](#): > > Ditto with the **MHaye** thing. He says multiple times that it’s not the use of the acronym that bothers him, it’s HOW it was used. But he’s still sidestepping the question that’s being asked! Yes, MHaye did say that he prefers not to use Scum, and that’s fine…but nobody’s really asking about what MHaye prefers. The question that’s being asked, which has been posed in different ways four separate times by my count, is WHY do you think that MHaye would have used that particular acronym for the first time on Night Zero (or, I guess, Day One) of a SCUM board, given that Scum have no need to come up with anything to refer to themselves as other than “us” or “we”? If you insist that the use of an acronym in the thread without reference to what it means is a tell that the acronym has been used and explained elsewhere, why couldn’t it have been a Mason board, for example? Wouldn’t Masons have a need to refer to the Scum as another entity that the Scum might not? But Pleonast does not answer these specific questions, instead repeating his same basic answer over and over again, claiming he’s already addressed it when he hasn’t. Look at **MHaye** ’s reason for using “SAHM” again. > [@MHaye](#): > > > [@Pleonast](#): > > > > “SAHM”? Stay at home mom? I don’t think that’s what you’re referring to. Please explain. > > It’s an acronym. > SAHM= Sauron And His Minions. > One of my quirks - I don’t like calling people “scum” so I try to work out what the bad-guy group is called in canon and use that. > I think “Forces of the Dark Lord” might work better though, so I’ll use that in future. The answer to the questionWHY do you think that MHaye would have used that particular acronym for the first time on Night Zero (or, I guess, Day One) of a SCUM board, given that Scum have no need to come up with anything to refer to themselves as other than “us” or “we”?is simplyHe doesn’t like calling people “scum” so he tries to work out what the bad-guy group is called in canon and uses that. I keep referring back to **MHaye** ’s response because it’s the answer to the question. I suppose it’s possible that he could be a mason instead of scum. But every mafia game has scum that can communicate secretly. Only some games allow masons that. That puts the likelihood ratio strongly in the direction that **MHaye** is scum. > [@](#): > > Another thing that I’ve noticed is that while **ed** has gotten a lot of flack (and votes) for his bad idea, **Pleonast** ’s almost equally bad idea (post 632) garnered hardly any attention at all. Heck, it was barely even discussed. I didn’t even notice it until my re-read of his posts. Had we actually done what he suggested, would we all be voting for **Pleo** now? And is that idea not just a glorified (and more subtle) way of fishing for potential power roles, as he rightly accuses **Meeko** and **Snickers** of attempting repeatedly? Or is it only fishing if you ask one person directly? That’s more of an argument against players attacking **Ed** but not **Pleo**. Personally, I think the difference is that **Ed** actually acted on his idea, while mine was merely mooted. ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1954 "2010-08-30T17:04:06Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > 1. In my analysis, I was assuming that everything else regarding **ed** ’s handshake stayed the same except for **Gadarene** and **Telcontar** staying out of it. I suppose you’re right that we can’t make that assumption when looking at the base motivation of things, but as it stands now based on numbers, I don’t think EVERY vanilla shook with **ed** , just enough to potentially give us a nice pool of confirmed Town with maybe a Scum or two in the pile as well, depending on whether or not they had the vanilla PM. It’s not like the Scum can now go down the list of non-shakers and start hitting power roles left and right. I’d have to guess that there are about as many vanillas in the non-shakers as there are in the shakers. So I wasn’t saying that we should have all come out and said “Hey, I’m vanilla” or “I’m a power” on Day One, I was operating under the parameters of how it played itself out. Here’s the potential scenarios as I see them. Please correct me if I’ve missed something obvious. 1. **Ed is town.** He starts the handshake to create a pool of confirmed town players, but makes a mistake and uses the powers section to handshake, accidentally outing power players. 2. **Ed is scum.** He starts the handshake to create a pool of people with different PMs, using the powers section to reveal who is ‘different’ to the scum. Currently, I think a lot of people think these two options are equally possible, resulting in a null tell. I don’t believe that’s the case. Remember, **Ed has done this before.** His mistake is easily made, I suppose, if you’ve never done this before. But he has experience in handshaking. Four games’ worth. And he hasn’t answered my question, which is: “In your previous handshake attempts, did you use the powers section?” If he’s vanilla, it was just a dumb mistake. But if he’s scum, it was a calculated play to reveal power roles to the scum while giving exactly zero information to the town. Nothing. Assuming the scum have the vanilla PM (they’d have to for a scummy Ed to post it), we are no closer to finding scum than before he tried his handshake. Even if we lynch him now, scum traded one of theirs for two of our power roles in the first two night kills. And _I don’t believe an experienced handshaker like Ed would have made a dumb mistake._ As for your hypothetical, if Gadarene and Telcontar had stayed out of the handshaking attempt, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. I wouldn’t be so focused on Ed. The fact that it failed spectacularly despite Ed’s games of experience in handshaking is what makes me so convinced Ed is scum. Throw in all of my other reasons for voting for him, and it just cements him in my mind as scum. ---
**Author:** ![special\_ed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@special\_ed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/special_ed)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1955 "2010-08-30T17:10:25Z")
> [@Astral\_Rejection](#): > > **@Special Ed:** > > Maybe you should be voting for me then. :). > > In case you missed it, I want to re-ask a question from earlier. When you handshook in your 4 previous games, did you use the powers section? It’s quite possible that I will be voting for you. Goodness, I can’t recall them all (and I only participated in 3 of them. 1 example was from a game where I didn’t shake hands but I was playing. I think NAF and Nanook were involved) In Princess Bride, I used the entire PM. Vanillas all had identical role PMs. It was that first time I tried. A Vanilla (Bear\_Nenno) was on the block. He claimed Vanilla and the same role as me (Peasant, I think). I asked him specifics about his PM. His responses confirmed that he shared my PM. Another player became involved and also shared confirmable information to me. The moderator stormed into the game and demanded that we stop and posted the Vanilla PM. Sock Mafia was more recent. we had a rule stating that we couldn’t quote our PMs. We all chose our socks and therefore had different color. I did use only the Win Condition section of my PM. The moderator charged in, accused me of cheating, edited my posts and threatened my very existence. I had a feeling that the Scum wouldn’t have the Town Win Condition because the moderator had posted the Win Conditions in the rules thread, but they were different from the one in my PM, which led me to believe that they’d added a 3rd party and edited the win condition. In this game, I erred. I should have only used my win condition statement, I suppose or been clear that I was trying to confirm as Vanilla. I used the final “section of my Role PM” I didn’t think it through thoroughly enough. In hindsight, I should have known that I was endangering the power roles. Also, since the win condition in this game was so simple, it would be quite likely that the Scum had it. ---
**Author:** ![special\_ed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@special\_ed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/special_ed)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1956 "2010-08-30T17:20:46Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > The only time I’ve ever seen it necessary to lynch a known town player was in a game on GB where a remorseful vig was outed and had killed a townie but scum redirected her kill from her to other players and was getting two NKs a night. If the town vig is town, at some point he or she should STOP vigging without a good idea of who might be scum, in that case. Agreed. Advising the Town Vig. Begging the Town Vig to shoot into the unconfirmed pool. All good things. Killing the Town Vig, only if they are remorseful and redirectable ---
**Author:** ![Drain\_Bead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@Drain\_Bead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drain_Bead)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1957 "2010-08-30T17:21:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > This is the scummiest post I’ve seen in a while. Calling a player’s lynch an inevitable, saying the player should’ve been Vig’d, even saying they’re likely scum, but not even placing a vote on them. How does calling a lynch of **ed** inevitable make me more likely to be Scum? More importantly, I did \*\*not \*\* say that **ed** should have been vigged. I said I’m surprised that he wasn’t. Often a Vig will take out someone who had been the vote runner-up–it’s one of the most frequently used Vig strategies I’ve seen. So my guess was that we don’t have a a Vig, or if we do they only get a one-shot kill or die if they’re wrong or something, because otherwise it would have been a perfectly valid pro-Town play to kill him last Night. Nowhere in that post did I make a judgment call that **ed** SHOULD have been vigged. To accuse me of doing so is worse word-twisting than anything else you’ve accused others of doing so far in this thread, and you’ve accused others of that quite a bit. I may have more to say to you after reading everything else, but I couldn’t let this BS go unchallenged. ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1958 "2010-08-30T17:23:24Z")
Fair enough. Thanks for answering my question. I’m gonna review everything I’ve posted about you, just to be sure my arguments still hold water. I’ve got plenty of Day left to go over everything, and some folks have been looking mighty scummy lately. ---
**Author:** ![Drain\_Bead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@Drain\_Bead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drain_Bead)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1959 "2010-08-30T17:28:34Z")
Okay. To follow up on the **MHaye** thing one more time. So **MHaye** doesn’t like calling the Scum Scum. You’re _still_ not answering my question! Why would THE SCUM need to come up with something to refer to themselves as IN THEIR OWN THREAD? Are they all discussing themselves in the third person? Doesn’t that seem very unlikely to you? And secondary to that, if by some strange need a Scummy MHaye wants to refer to himself and his team in the third person, why wouldn’t he use the SoD moniker that was given in the opening rules of the thread? Another dodge of the question. Combine this with your recent twist of my words, and I’m back to thinking you’re the scummiest in the thread. **vote Pleonast** ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867/1960 "2010-08-30T17:39:59Z")
\*\*Vote Count: Specialed(2): Astralrejection, Chronos, Astralrejection(1): Redskeezix Meeko(1): Pleonast Pleonast(2): Meeko, Drainbead \*\* [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867.md?page=97) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lord-of-the-rings-mafia/549867.md?page=99)