# \[Mafia game\] The Realm of Phere **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [April 1, 2012, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480 "2012-04-01T15:04:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 21
**Author:** ![BobArrgh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobarrgh/32/2881_2.png) [@BobArrgh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobArrgh)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/401 "2012-04-09T14:17:08Z")
Hmmm … interesting that more than one person protected **Visorslash**. One explanation could be that his Scum Buddies protected him. Another explanation is that his Mason Buddies protected him. In any case, **Inner Stickler** seems to be tied to **Visorslash** in some way. Of course, this could be a direct buddy-buddy connection, or it could be an indirect connection (as in, Inner Stickler having an action where he protects the second-place vote getter, regardless of who it is.) ---
**Author:** ![Scathach](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Scathach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scathach)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/402 "2012-04-09T14:17:24Z")
> [@GuiriEnEspana](#): > > I didn’t intend to suggest it was a stupid idea, I was just thinkng through what would need to happen for it to effectively become a second lynch and how feasible that would be. Oh I wasn’t offended, just admitting that it’s very tricky to actually implement 🙂 > [@GuiriEnEspana](#): > > A privately arranged group attack might have a little more success however, in order to get sufficient numbers to cause death, the risk of infiltration is high. And a reason for allowing PM’s etc between players just became clear:smack: I’m still kind of curious as to how much HP the Demon Lord has, and if he can be killed though. ---
**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:** [April 9, 2012, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/403 "2012-04-09T14:33:37Z")
> [@GuiriEnEspana](#): > > Astral, the extra votes, both visible and hidden, put your concerns about vote shenanigans into a different light. Which were you responsible for, the one on Gadarene or the three on Mosier? None of them. I can’t affect the vote total beyond my own vote. I suspected there would be something like this, but I didn’t expect four somethings. Looks like a 2-vote margin won’t be enough. ---
**Author:** ![MHaye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bbe5ce/32.png) [@MHaye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MHaye)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/404 "2012-04-09T14:39:34Z")
Fascinating. I missed the extra vote on Gadarene and the one on Mosier. I speculate that they are separate players (although can’t prove this, and the vote charger roles in Malazan are a counterargument). The three late votes for Mosier are probably a single power; one-shot, I hope. Normal, the vote for Silver Jan was basically insurance against the possibility of not finding a better candidate before Day’s end. Do you think it would have been better to place the vote with no explanation? I don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/405 "2012-04-09T14:55:21Z")
I’m alive! 🙂 Here’s how this is going to go: (1) I’m going to point to my post after day was called where I think I’m the lynch and express my desire that town win the game. (2) I’m going to state that because this was (in my mind) effectively a dead-post, I would have no motivation to be less than honest about my affiliation, and therefore I am an obvious townie. (3) People are going to say that it could all have been part of some elaborate ploy on my part where I knew (under this theory) that I wasn’t going to be the lynch despite my leading in votes at the end of Day. (4) People are going to call me scummy for thinking my “dead-post” clears me. (5) People are going to call me scummy for pointing out my “dead-post.” (6) People are going to call me scummy for making this list. Does that about cover it? 🙂 Actual thoughts about actual things later. ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/406 "2012-04-09T14:56:33Z")
Whoops, forgot one: (7) People are going to call me scummy for predicting that people are going to call me scummy. ---
**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:** [April 9, 2012, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/407 "2012-04-09T15:03:26Z")
Missed one. 1. Only scum would put so much effort into circumstantially proving they aren’t scum. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/408 "2012-04-09T15:12:25Z")
> [@Astral\_Rejection](#): > > Missed one. > > 1. Only scum would put so much effort into circumstantially proving they aren’t scum. > > 😃 Not much effort at all. 🙂 And I’d prefer to be seen as clearish so, y’know, Town doesn’t waste a lynch or a vig on me. One thing I’d like to do at some point is go over the wagons and see who voted me when and for what claimed reason. Voting me on the basis of a “me too” vote that I later elaborated upon is reeeeeeeeeeeally flimsy, especially when I’m a lead wagon. I don’t buy that everyone did it in good faith. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/409 "2012-04-09T15:16:13Z")
> [@MHaye](#): > > Normal, the vote for Silver Jan was basically insurance against the possibility of not finding a better candidate before Day’s end. Do you think it would have been better to place the vote with no explanation? I don’t. No, I think it would have come off as more “real” not to work in such a top-down fashion, nor to overdo a simple vote to such a huge extent. This is what your post looks like: – hmm, bad bandwagon here, probably on a townie – hmm, let’s examine his voters one by one and see what looks bad enough to vote for – hmm, let’s pick one of several more or less equally bad-looking options and dress it up with a full post-analysis that turns up really nothing more damning than the original “this vote is not good”, then place a vote anyway And the bit I chopped off, about Astral (and Gadarene) and how you wanted to (and ultimately did) come back to them later – it just feels all backwards to me in terms of priorities, MHaye. Silver Jan had no votes and hadn’t been the subject of much discussion. Astral did have a vote or votes and was the subject of a lot of discussion, much of it revolving around Gadarene, who was a potential lynch target. Now what’s more important for a townie to figure out under limited time constraints – getting a handle on a situation that could affect the lynch, or getting a vote on the record, given an expressed interest in doing both things but a lack of time to do it in? I’d think the former. And what did you actually prioritize, and to what extent? The latter, and to a great extent. Your whole Silver Jan post could have been summed up in a paragraph or so, or even less: “I’m suspicious of Silver Jan for voting Visorslash on such a thin reason and not unvoting him (also on a thin reason). I’d like to get it on the record before going on to the other interesting stuff. Vote Silver Jan.” The end. Everything but that is window-dressing, misplaced to boot, and to me at the moment, not terribly convincing as being anythign other than a big show of trying to do the right thing as a townie. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/410 "2012-04-09T15:20:05Z")
Well, Gadarene, really all those points could be boiled down to: – somebody used a lot of effort to keep you and/or Astral alive – that somebody is not a good guy in the game – that somebody is either framing you, at great expense unless those extra votes are in fact unlimited, or has a different interest in keeping you alive and kicking The rest is not worth discussing. ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/411 "2012-04-09T15:27:28Z")
> [@Normal\_Phase](#): > > Well, Gadarene, really all those points could be boiled down to: > > – somebody used a lot of effort to keep you and/or Astral alive > – that somebody is not a good guy in the game > – that somebody is either framing you, at great expense unless those extra votes are in fact unlimited, or has a different interest in keeping you alive and kicking > > The rest is not worth discussing. That’s not true, actually. My points are going to my post that I made when I was lynch leader and I assumed I was dead. At the very least, my post should be considered a data point towards my townieness. If you want to believe that it was an elaborate ploy because I somehow knew that the lynch would end up getting flipped, there’s nothing stopping you, but it certainly isn’t the simplest explanation. ---
**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:** [April 9, 2012, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/412 "2012-04-09T15:30:47Z")
> [@Normal\_Phase](#): > > that somebody is not a good guy in the game How do you know this? While disrupting the lynch is pretty scummy, vote powers are generally a town power. It’s not completely out of the question that a town player could have choosen to save Gadarene. At the very least, we shouldn’t completely discount that idea immediately, especially as it seems likely more than one player affected the vote. > [@](#): > > – that somebody is either framing you, at great expense unless those extra votes are in fact unlimited, or has a different interest in keeping you alive and kicking This part I agree with completely. It’s very pro-scum to leave town’s top targets (me and Gad) alive for town to worry about toMorrow. It would seem to implicate scum having some agenda, but with multiple players affecting the vote (as seems to be the case), we can’t draw any conclusions with certainty. ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/413 "2012-04-09T15:36:09Z")
I will also again point out that I am apparently one of the “town’s top targets” because (1) I piggybacked Guiri’s vote of Astral early without explaining my read sufficiently at that time; and (2) I was unable to post this weekend. That’s it. If someone would like to present a more elaborate or detailed case on why they think I am likely to be scum, I would be interested in hearing it, but those two points are what everyone’s votes have boiled down to so far. And, frankly, that’s not a good case. Dopers fall prey to voting inertia too much, in my opinion. Someone becomes an early target for x reason or y reason, and then they stay a target throughout that day and later days often for no other reason than that they were an early target. In the beginning, however, we have very little information on which to base our decisions. As we gain information, we as Town should be willing to let our reads be flexible and dynamic, to adapt to the present game-state rather than simply thinking, “well, people thought Gad was scummy at the beginning of day 1. He’s a good vote.” ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/414 "2012-04-09T15:37:09Z")
Particularly when the reasons for finding me scummy at the beginning of day 1 are, as I’ve said, a load of quaffle. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/415 "2012-04-09T15:54:14Z")
After the Silver Jan vote, I make some noise criticising it, and MHaye says something like “fair enough, it was weak anyway”, which – fine. he had stated his intent to review Astral previously, so I don’t have anything to say about that aspect. > [@MHaye](#): > > I’ve opted to review the posts of Astral Rejection (AR), not realising how prolific he has been. 90% of the reason is that he’s voted for me and that caught my eye. The other 10% is the shenanigans at around 10pm yesterday. That might have been enough on its own, but maybe I’d just have looked at his posts around then. > > I’m not going to look at every post, just what I consider the significant ones. > > [post=14936335]Post 26[/post] has attracted some heat. I read it at the time, and still do, as a simple cheesy pun. > > [post=14938836]Post 66[/post]: I think AR makes a couple of good points here. Plausible speculation. > > [post=14938902]Post 78[/post]: Votes Choie for suggesting Guiri’s vote for AR might have been in jest. I can see what AR is saying. I’m not sure I would have voted for it, but that’s just a difference of opinion. For the record, I can’t see what Astral is saying here at all, never mind the vote. > [@](#): > > [post=14939160]Post 84[/post]: Questions Gadarene on his vote. > > [post=14941619]Post 169[/post]: Pushes Gadarene further, unvotes Choie and explains that he caught a hint of something that he can’t detect any longer. > > [post=14942247]Post 186[/post]: Votes me. This is the big one, obviously (at least from my point of view. Others may tend to focus on his vote-jumping.)AR takes issue with me not jumping into a mess of Day 1 votes, fists swinging. Frankly, I don’t know why he expects me to. > > I find early Day 1 votes are almost never worth commenting on. Eitehr they’re joke votes, random votes or drive-bys with the intention of getting the voted-for person to participate. What those votes have in common is a lack of any real justification. > > In my opinion, nothing’s going to be learned by criticising them as they happen, they’re pretty much meaningless except for the voter and wheover is voted for. Any value we’re going to extract from them comes at the end of the Day (or more likely, future Days) when we have perspective and the evidence of several Days actions and role reveals. Apropos of nothing, I disagree. But that should be no surprise. > [@](#): > > Given that opinion, and the fact that my knee-jerk reactions cannot be trusted (as discussed in [post=14943631]post 272[/post], why _should_ I jump in at the time? It’s going to waste my time and add to the fog. All I’m going to do is note them and carry on. If you don’t like that, tough. I’m not going to change my playstyle. You know, I do recognize that Astral could be scummy with scum sauce (just look at that vote count) and you as pure as the driven snow, but you’re still slinging it around pretty heavy here. I know your playstyle as well as anyone, and it still struck me, once Astral had pointed it out, that you’d managed to go half the day without commenting on anything remotely vote related at all. Correct me if I’m wrong – night is a good time for that sort of thing – but I think that you generally do, when you’re town. You might not place a vote, but you’re in there somewhere, one in a while, saying something. If find this to be a valid vote, if also a really easy one that a scum Astral could toss out without breaking a sweat. (For that matter, it would be an easy vote even if he’s scum with you.) > [@](#): > > In fact, if I do jump in hard with early votes on Day 1, either I’ve found a smoking gun or I have a hidden agenda. Was there really a smoking gun there? > > Inner Stickler mentioned my name and raised my grudge warning. It amused me to post that. AR started his game with a pun, but criticises me for opening my game with a lighthearted hail to another player who was trying to steal my thunder? Noted.[post=14942255]Post 187[/post]: Compares his post to one of Glee’s and asks Guiri and Gadarene why they singled him out for votes over Glee. Defends this in [post=14942677]post 229[/post]. > > We now come to the vote shenanigans.AR asks me why I haven’t weighed in on the main topics – a question already annswerd, see 272 and comments above – and switches to Gadarene, then (on having his error pointed out) switches back. > > The actual vote switch isn’t as important (imo) as his explanation of why. He defends his change in [post=14943822]post 279[/post] as wanting to ensure no-one could jump from voting Gad to voting Visorslash and cause a sudden last-minute change in the vote lead. Now, that could be a respectable defence, if employed alongside an explanation of why he considered Gadarene more likely than Visorslash to be Mafia. In AR’s defence, he’s been pushing Gadarene about his vote all Day; against that you have to consider that Gadarene has voted for AR while Visorslash hasn’t. Hold up a second here, I remember this from the first reading as being something I wanted to point out. So voting Gadarene woudl be defensible if Astral had expressed suspicion of Gadarene over Visorslash. Astral actually HAD questioned Gadarene a couple of times, versus Visorslash not at all. Does that not demonstrate the requisite level of suspicion, right there? It should not take much, and you yourself state that you have no issue with such a vote being placed as such. Also, how is Gadarene having voted for Astral supposed to be a point AGAINST Astral’s having enough suspicion of Gad to return the favor if he felt the urge? It should be the opposite. Your argument here is muddled, you seem to be trying to make him look more suspicious than he is, despite the veneer of fair-mindedness. All in all you have turned up no reason so far that you yourself should find Astral worth voting for, save for one reason that is IMO precisely backwards. > [@](#): > > Inner Stickler suggests possible Mafia motivations, which AR admits he can’t disprove in [post=14943837]post 282[/post]. Well fine. But what does that have to do with you? > [@](#): > > In [post=14943856]post 286[/post] AR says that he aimed to “preserve what town had selected as their lynch.” That could be a very interesting slip of the tongue. It seems to suggest that he knows that the voters on Visorslash include anti-Town elements, which raises the question of how he knew that. Alternatively, he might be a Mafiate pushing a Townie wagon further into the lead (which doesn’t have any implications for Visorslash, by the way). No way. I would never in a million years consider that first option as an explanation for Astral’s words. IS’s "he might be trying too hard to look townie’ rings true. This does not, this is a scummy PIS accusation right out of Drain Bead’s textbook, IMO. > [@](#): > > Or it might be the gift of a clear conscience. Oh, so it might be nothing. > [@](#): > > [post=14944165]Post 302[/post]: Claims he had not thought through all the implications and possibilities when he decided to switch. If he’s Town this is almost certainly true; if he’s not it’s a fib. Unfortunately we can’t tell (unless there’s a lie detector role in the game) without lynching him. Pity in a way. Argh, this cannot be real! Does anyone else see this? It’s fake contemplation, IMO, it’s all for show. > [@](#): > > It seems plain that AR has some suspicions of Gadarene, but failed to explain why he thought Visorslash was less suspicious. Consequently the vote switch does leave a bad impression.Enough of an impression to overshadow the very faint suspicion Silver Jan left me with? Yes, much more so. Couple this with his ignoring my playstyle, which he has been exposed to, and which I have already commented on once and had completely ignored, that’s enough for a vote. > > Unvote. > Vote Astral Rejection And so, at the end of it all, despite – believing the vote switch in itself would not be suspicious if Astral showed enough suspicion of Gadarene over Visorslash – failing to demonstrate (or demonstrating with backwards logic) that Astral had not met that threshhold – qualifying every single statement he made about six ways to Sunday he votes for Astral. And the thing is, I could buy a townie MHaye voting Astral merely on the play style thing. If he’s innocent, it’s as valid a point from his perspective as I think Astral’s [would be/would have been/was/pick the right tense and mood please] from his. But it’s surrounded with too much excess verbiage – much of which I have significant problems with on its own merits – to ring completely true. And finally, this bit? > [@](#): > > Consequently the vote switch does leave a bad impression.[/indent]Enough of an impression to overshadow the very faint suspicion Silver Jan left me with? Yes, much more so. I’m going to pull a Pizza here. Rhetorical question? That you answer yourself? You sure aren’t trying to convince anyone of Astral’s guilt right here. No, you’re trying to convince the townies that you have a good reason for changing your vote. That’s what scum do. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/416 "2012-04-09T15:56:24Z")
> [@Gadarene](#): > > That’s not true, actually. My points are going to my post that I made when I was lynch leader and I assumed I was dead. At the very least, my post should be considered a data point towards my townieness. If you want to believe that it was an elaborate ploy because I somehow knew that the lynch would end up getting flipped, there’s nothing stopping you, but it certainly isn’t the simplest explanation. But the thing is, if scum, you WOULD have known, or at least known it was a very strong possibility, that you would live. So you’d have had all the motive you’d need to make such a post. IMO that makes the whole thing WIFOM of the purest sort and not worth discussing. ---
**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:** [April 9, 2012, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/417 "2012-04-09T15:56:39Z")
> [@Gadarene](#): > > Particularly when the reasons for finding me scummy at the beginning of day 1 are, as I’ve said, a load of quaffle. Totally unlike your reason for voting for me at the beginning of Day 1, right? 😃 ---
**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:** [April 9, 2012, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/418 "2012-04-09T16:04:10Z")
Re: Normal Phase’s entire case on MHaye. I agree, completely. You’ve phrased my own suspicions better than I probably could have. There was quite a bit pinging me about him, but I was struggling to put it into words. ---
**Author:** ![choie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/choie/32/7829_2.png) [@choie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choie)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/419 "2012-04-09T16:06:00Z")
Hoo doggies, this is a big load of WTF. Is it possible that one of the anti-Mosier voters had their votes tripled? Or quadrupled, I guess, since it looks like there were four extra votes. But why is one of those extra votes anonymous, i.e. not credited to **askthepizzaguy**? And ditto the extra vote on **Gadarene**? Did whoever placed the extra vote on **Gadarene** _know_ that someone was placing a fuckton of extra votes on **Mosier** and try to save **Mosier**? But then wouldn’t it have been smarter to just add the votes to **Astral** , who’s in second place? Are the lost hit points definitely related to the “I’ll protect you!” cries? Why was someone ( **Inner Stickler** if the color is chronologically correct, which I don’t see any reason to doubt) so determined to protect **Visorslash** during the battle? And it looks like he had reason to, considering **Visorslash** was obviously being targetted for whatever reason. To address **Gadarene** ’s “I said Go Town! after EOD so I must be Townie!” point, it’s a good one, except I’m pretty sure I’ve read games where a lynch leader proclaimed “Go town!” before the final color was at last reported and they flipped scum, only then to get all “mwah-ha-ha!” in their _real_ final comments. Plus, the fact that you _weren’t_ lynched could indicate that you knew you weren’t going to die, so that last heroic “I regret I have one life to give for my country!” moment was merely a way of looking good. \*And on preview I see that **Normal Phase** has just pointed out the same thing I did about **Gadarene** ’s noble goodbye speech. Ah well. \* … Or you could really be Town, and it’s just a coincidence that someone saved your ass. But I still don’t understand why the extra votes wouldn’t have been placed on **Astral** since it would’ve taken fewer of them to save **Gadarene**. In fact it looks like someone went to a lot of trouble to save **Astral** while pinning the blame on **Gadarene** by tossing off one vote on **Gadarene** just to… y’know, I have no idea how to end that sentence. What _was_ the point of that one-off **Gadarene** vote unless it was someone trying to save **Mosier** , someone who apparently know about the extra vote mechanics? Is someone trying to cast blame on the **Mosier** voters, or the **Astral** voters, or the **Gadarene** voters? Or on **Astral** and **Gadarene** themselves? Is it someone not aligned with any of those three groups and/or suspects? Holy crap I am confused. I think I’ve just described a conspiracy involving almost everyone. If anyone knows their Agatha Christie classics, it’s like… Murder on the Orient Express … only with blame instead of knives in the dark. Seriously, people: W. T. F.?! ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480/420 "2012-04-09T16:07:48Z")
> [@Astral\_Rejection](#): > > How do you know this? While disrupting the lynch is pretty scummy, vote powers are generally a town power. It’s not completely out of the question that a town player could have choosen to save Gadarene. At the very least, we shouldn’t completely discount that idea immediately, especially as it seems likely more than one player affected the vote. > > This part I agree with completely. It’s very pro-scum to leave town’s top targets (me and Gad) alive for town to worry about toMorrow. It would seem to implicate scum having some agenda, but with multiple players affecting the vote (as seems to be the case), we can’t draw any conclusions with certainty. The first part is based on it being explicitly said that the traitor is pulling the Demon Lord’s strings, and three of the extra votes being explictily attributed to the Demon Lord. You’d have to do a lot of convincing to get me to belive those three votes came from anywhere else. The single ones on Gadarene and Mosier, sure, they could be from anywhere. I have some issues with you singling out that last statement of mine when I’ve said or implied elsewhere that I have difficulty believing that the traitor would use such a strong power just to frame a couple of townies when he could instead use it more productively to save scum. And I’ve also had I have difficulty believing the power is unlimited. It would be a brutal blow to the town’s ability to lynch scum, if so. There’s a bit of wiggle room in the gray area there; I don’t consider it a slam dunk that either of you are scum, but I’d still bet that way if I had to. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480.md?page=20) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mafia-game-the-realm-of-phere/617480.md?page=22)