Duh. That should go unsaid, but sure. I agree with that stance as that’s new data to the pile.
The two scum factions cannot win together, so they’re working against each other as much as they are against the town. It takes a real corner case for there to be a case where one scum faction works with the town (likely if there’s only two of them left, the other scum faction is on the verge of winning, and then one might claim scum to help guide the town away from losing the game for both sides.)
If you set you maximum posts per page to a high number, the size of thread gets a lot less intimidating. Sweet, delicious placebo.
sachetorte, this is different from Day 1 in that we can’t vote yet. But that’s not too big a difference, because we can still decide who we want to vote for, tell everyone else that we want to vote for someone, and then place the vote as soon as the official Day starts.
On the patsy, it’s an even better confirmable role than most, because it can’t be safely counterclaimed. If we do get two Patsy claimants, then we’re obviously going to lynch one… and even if we hit the wrong one (i.e., the genuine Townie), then he’ll take out the other one as he dies.
I don’t think the Patsy should claim on Day 1, though. Confirmed Townies are most valuable when there are a bunch of them at once. One confirmed out of a pool of 50-something players makes almost no difference, and will almost certainly be killed in some way or another before we get enough other confirmed and the player list shrinks enough that it would be worthwhile. If the Patsy gets investigated and accused, e can claim then, with the same result as a Day 1 claim, and all we’ve lost is a wasted Detective action. Plus, again with the large number of players, it’s unlikely that the Patsy would get investigated in the first few Days, anyway.
That would be great! We lynch one. If it’s the actual patsy, they take out the fake claimer. One for one trade, totally fine. If it’s the fake claimer, go team! Either way is great for Town.
This game is going to be nuts, I can see it already. Its been so long since I played, I hope it doesn’t turn out completely insane.
**No, we are not fully ready. It’s a pretty big game and we have a lot of behind the scenes stuff to take care of. **
I say all the obvious things so you smart doctor types can work on the more difficult stuff.
Confirming my vanilla Town role PM.
No lynch: there’d have to be a very compelling reason to give up our kill. Not have much info is not compelling.
Mafia vs Wolves: best to catch as we can. We can worry about specific win conditions when we’re in mid-game (half the scum dead).
Third parties: in this setup it’s always a mislynch, since we only need to eliminate Scum. Non-exclusives must be able to show pro-Town actions if they want their claim to be taken seriously. Claiming immediately and accounting for every action immediately after taken is the most pro-Town possible.
Exclusives must be stopped. This might involve a vigilante kill. But the only sure way to stop them is by winning before they do. Vigging Scum (that is, advancing our win condition) is a better approach, unless we have specific knowledge otherwise.
Please note that I am still out of country and won’t be able to participate much. Of course, I’m not likely to reach mine old levels of posting anyway.
Well, let’s see. People are posting fluff and talking about game mechanics. I have no clue in the world who is scum or how I might go about finding out.
So, I guess the answer is “not in any significant way”!
So this made me think of what’s going on in the background, and why we wouldn’t be able to start yet. The only thing I can think of is setting up scum/3rd Party boards. I’m not very confident that I’ll get an answer to this, but I can’t see how it can hurt to ask if the Wolves and Mob are allowed to conspire before the game start.
** Do the Scum get to canoodle on Night Zero? **
I do think the Patsy should claim - but not yet. If they are in the position to do a vig kill after their death, we need to have a better idea of who is who than we have right now.
I think I hold a investigation as being more valuable. Also there is the fact that the player with the investigation will be more tempted to claim after finding ‘scum’ to help with the Lynch (not solid strategy, but it happens). Then we have an outed investigator because of the patsy.
Claiming is more to remove the liability of what happens if the patsy is investigated rather than creating a confirmed town. Remember, I’m of the opinion that Millers should claim on Day One even in closed setups (and lynching them)! So the fact that the pasty is an open role and turns into a confirmed town is just a nice bonus.
The rules said that everyone is allowed to talk at any time, in any in-game venue they have available. I presume that “at any time” includes Night 0.
And I’m not inclined to worry much about third parties one way or another, until and unless one claims, and then we should decide on a case-by-case basis whether that person should die. We certainly shouldn’t reflexively kill all third-party claimants; I’ve seen Towns shoot themselves in the foot pretty badly that way.
sachertorte, I think you’re thinking in terms of minimizing the liability of the Miller. But in this game, the Miller isn’t a liability; e’s an asset. Es mere existence is worth nearly as much as a Detective investigation, since e can confirm emself. So if e gets investigated, it’s a wash. But the key is that, in a game this size, e probably won’t get investigated, at least not very quickly.
As far as tempting a Detective to claim early, again due to the size of this game, I think that Detectives should probably hold off a lot longer than they ordinarily would. If we get one Scum for free, well, that only takes us 1/14 of the way to victory. And there’s less risk of the Detective dying before claiming, again because of the numbers.
Skimming through the roles, I see a potential flaw: Scum are not informed of their teammates in their PMs. This gives the possibility of “ignorant” Scum who don’t know who their teammates are (since the mods don’t force someone to read the secret forums). Scum who can’t coordinate or even know who’s on their team are much harder for us to find.
Perhaps the game was balanced with this in mind. In any case, we should not expect Scum to know who’s on their own team.
Don’t forget that in an open setup like this, unless an about to be lynched scum feels like going one on one against confirmable town, their choices for claim are vanilla or third party. And third party is going to the be the only option if they’re caught by a watcher role or some such.
In other words, don’t take 3p claims at face value.
Perhaps. The size of the game does have a strong influence on the probabilities and playing strategy that I don’t fully appreciate yet. While the number of players is quite large, the number of kills per cycle is also quite large. While it may make sense for the detectives to hold off longer than usual, I’m not convinced that the math agrees. Furthermore… human nature.
I am operating under the assumption that all scum know who each other are via the common communication board. If that is not the case, then I would classify such as “a hidden element of the scum PM,” which was explicitly disavowed by the moderators.
Good point, for a claim under pressure. I don’t think I’d be much inclined to believe such a claim, either. But it’s also not uncommon for a third party to claim on their own (usually either very early, or when the third party believes it’ll be beneficial in some way).
Hm.:dubious: Derpclear attempt? I will throw out the ceremonial first FOS of the game!
(Glossary: Derpclear: When a player appears Town (truly or otherwise) by asking a question that Scum would already know the answer to).
My analysis is based on the “no hidden element” principle. Since there is no stated requirement for Scum to read or post on their secret boards, then there is none.
So a member of a scum team would choose to not visit the off board- and willingly ‘play blind’
is that what you are saying?
good for Town but poor scum form I think