I’m back. I apologize for my lack of participation thus far. I was at a conference for the weekend, and have been recovering from the red-eye flight.
You wanted more participation, here we go. At this point, shouldn’t our top priority be to check the people near the top of the list, rather than the bottom? Taking Naf’s power claim as true, it’s useless until tomorrow, and if he uses it without a REALLY good justification, then we lynch him for major scummy behavior. If he’s not scum, then he’s not likely to undermine the work of both the Captain and the Security officer. If he is scum, then yes, it’d be great to lynch him, but I don’t see how examining him is better choice than checking out the people near the top of the list, both the officers and those likely to rise into the officer ranks after a nightkill of a power.
I’d think the captain and security officer are the probably lowest on the officer list, since they’d have to both be scum to start brigging town intentionally, and even then, that would raise questions pretty fast. I’m betting that will be pretty tricky, even if, as Hal Briston pointed out, one of the officers is already likely to be scum. They’d have to get scum to both XO and engineering, and then kill the captain to do it. And they’re vulnerable to a suspicious hacker who could destroy this delicate balance. Granted, scum will want to be in as many of the officer roles as they can, but these two roles, with their requirement to work in tandem and the fragility of setting it up, are the least prone to abuse.
I think the doctor, engineer, and XO, in that order, would be the priorities to confirm. Of course we can’t completely trust the doctor until he’s been inspected by someone we trust, but I suppose we’ll have to take the info with a grain of salt and rely on scum not wanting to out themselves by claiming that a townie is scum and getting lynched the next day. It seems to me that, at least for now, forcing a mislynch is less useful for scum than remaining hidden.
Therefore I think your suggestion that Naf is “just as good a target as anyone else” is not just wrong, but obviously so.
Vote Inner Stickler