That’s because I don’t think it’s indicative, one way or the other. I pointed out a while back that I think the most suspicious voting pattern is that of bandwagoneering- initiating a vote looks too suspicious, so the smart mafioso wouldn’t ever start a vote. They’d just hop onto, and reinforce, votes against non-mafia. If it looks like it’s going to pass by a large enough margin, or if it’s down to a run-off between two townies, they’d back off and try to cast aspersions against future targets. They’d also tend to shoot towards the most suspicious-looking targets. Doing this would make their voting record damn near invisible.
I’ve initiated votes just about every day (sadly, my aim ain’t all that great). You’ve done a bit of bandwagoneering, and have hopped from sure things to future targets (me). Which looks more suspicious?
Bear in mind, I don’t expect to last much longer. One of the reasons why I’m not going to defend myself too strenuously is that I think my death, more than anyone else’s, will be very instructive as to voting histories.
[SUB]Of course, I also pointed out that I think a completely valid Mafia strategy would be to vote purely randomly and, basically, hide in anonymity. I’m not certain that’s not their strategy in this game. After all, we seem to be doing SO well as it is, ya know? sigh[/SUB]
I’d disagree that the recruitment of the Watchman or Doctor is no better for the Mafia than a straight-out hit. Even though they would provide no additional direct benefit to the mafia than a vanilla recruit, they would no longer be in a position to protect the town. A turncoat Watchman is as bad as a dead Watchman as far as the town is concerned.
Also, I think it’s dangerous to discount any possibility about last night. The mafia might be going for a quick knockout by going ahead and recruiting a townie to their side. Even with the obvious deterrant of the remaining Do-Gooder. As long as there’s a Do-Gooder in the mix, a mafia recruitment would be risky. But then again, the larger the town, the less of a chance of accidentally recruiting the Do-Gooder.
Supposing for a moment that there are five mafia amongst us, the probability of recruiting the Do-Gooder would be 1/10 or 10%. If the mafia were to wait until the balance was say, one mafia and four town, if the Do-Gooder was still walking the green, the probability would then be 1/4 or 25%. A late recruitment best makes sense for them assuming the Do-Gooder is dead at that point. Maybe that’s not an assumption they’re willing to make, and they went ahead and took their chances while they were still good.
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Since the probability of a Watchman block is only 1/6, and the probability of a doctor block at this point is only in the neighborhood of 1/15, we can’t ignore the possibility that they spent their recruit bid last night.
Just a comment on your “bandwagoneering” tactics: I think that initiating a vote is just as likely a tactic for mafia as is voting in the middle, as is voting at the end of a bandwagon. It all depends on the situation.
However, I doubt that you’ll see “clustering” of mafia votes. In other words, if a scum votes for someone (s)he will probably wait for some unsuspecting citizen to vote or, at least, wait for a while to go by before (s)he votes for the same person. (Sadly, an untested theory, since we are yet to find someone who fits that description) And I agree on the “laying back” from citizen runoffs (like Day 2), to let townies butcher each other.
Now: what do you mean by saying
From what sure things have I hopped to what other targets?
On day one I changed my vote from ComeToTheDarkSideWeHaveCookies to percypercy. On day two I never wavered from dnooman. On day three I voted (late) for fluiddruid.
I have, actually, never voted for you, except for today.
Are you sure about that? I don’t recall his vote for percypercy, and its not on the spreadsheet. He voted for Projammer and dnooman, as did fluiddruid, CaerieD, and Hal Briston.
Unless I’m mistaken, fluiddruid is the only person in the game with a vote riding on all three townie lynchings. Which is another reason she remains on the top of my scum list.
To be fair, Lightnin’, I already mentioned at the start of this day that the main reason I think you or fluiddruid should be lynched today is to find out whether the vote swings on day one and three were caused by random fluctuations of townie votes or by deliberate actions of Mafia scum.
If it’s the former, at least some of the scum are hiding in plain sight (in other words, participating fully and influencing votes). If it’s the latter they probably let townies slug it out and, as you said, jumped on already existing bandwagons.
I’ve found a few suspicious things from it, but I’m going to wait until we’ve sorted out the** fluiddruid/Lightnin’ **stuff and see what my suspicious parties have done. If there’s anything there, I’ll make my case. After all, even if they are Mafia, those two can’t be the only Mafia.
I’ll ask again: Omi no Kami, any reason why you’ve never had a final vote? Just two vote/unvotes for fluid and one for Kyrie. That looks really weird to me. One or two days might be understandable, but three? We need something to go on, dear, so if you’re a townie, start leaving a paper trail!
Also, please let me know if I’ve made any mistakes…wouldn’t want to be accused of a cover-up, would I?
Well I thought I’d addressed this pretty clearly in my analysis posts, but the only times I’m comfortable voting are when I either a) want to provoke a reaction to see how the votee defends themself, or b) have dependable evidence to go on. As I recall, the vote for Kyrie early on was because he and a few others all jumped on me together, and since it was pretty much every person for themselves at that point I thought that the voting block might be indicative of a group effort (read: mafia).
As for fluid, I’ve been pretty thorough explaining my flipflopping. The first time I voted for her she really, really looked scummy to me: when she spent the first day or two quibbling about rules and demanding justifications for why people were using rudimentary strategies that she probably already understood, I thought she was probing for something based on how people explained their strategies. Since that strategy was just as likely to unearth evidence of power roles as it was to find mafia, I was worried that she was looking for detective/doctor/mason tells.
The second time I voted for her was when I had reviewed the thread, and she simply looked really, really scummy to me; no smoking gun, but I outlined a lot of the things that bothered me on my vote post. She defended herself in what seemed to me was an evasive manner, which just made me more certain… but as people started agreeing with me I realized that there was a real danger of starting a bandwagon. I assumed that other players would find evidence I missed, if she were really guilty, so I unvoted and watched to see if the momentum would continue.
Oh! That’s only the reasoning behind the votes I did make. The reason I never had a final vote was because I’ve never been convinced that anyone on the chopping block was guilty, and since it only takes a small percentage of the player population to off someone I’d really rather see people with reasons vote: voting arbitrarily or in agreement with the group doesn’t leave a useful paper trail, and since there’s never been someone who I really felt was asking for it I haven’t voted.
Ah, but it does! It matters who you’re in agreement with, and it matters if you disagree with all of them. Not putting in a final vote makes it look like you’ve got something to hide. It’s almost as bad as voting no lynch.
I’m not accusing you of being scum, I’m just truly curious as to why you think it’s good for the town that you abstain. If we all abstained when we were unsure, then only the Mafia would be voting. Just my two cents.
Oh, and I don’t really care about the flip-flopping…many of us have done that. It makes sense. It’s not a “scum tell,” in my opinion at least.
I probably see where you’re trying to go, but I don’t buy it. If I don’t trust any of the other players enough to agree with them on principle, and I don’t see or provide any pervasive argument for one player’s guilt or another, my voting is going to essentially be a random action. Since nothing pervasive is motivating it, it’s going to be an extremely inaccurate way to judge my actions.
I have to agree with Millit here. I have no reason to suspect you, but by not putting your neck out at least a little, you start to look like scum to the town, and like a power role to the mafia, both of which are bad if you’re pro-town. Also, what happens if you get killed by the mafia tonight… how much have you helped the town by not being more deliberate with your accusations? I believe it was **Idle ** (correct me if I’m wrong) that said your only fear as a townie should be that if you die, the town learns nothing. That is, I don’t expect anyone to post every thought that crosses his mind (like I often do).
IMO, not voting doesn’t help, because someone is going to get lynched every night whether you vote or not. You don’t even have to vote for X because you think X is the most scummy, maybe you vote for Y (who is next closest in votes) because you think X is more likely to be town than why. But providing no vote trail with no justifications means that if you’re targetted by mafia (assuming you’re pro-town), we get pretty much no information. You’re almost never going to be absolutely sure, so you can’t wait until then to vote.
{Bolding Mine}
Is this a slip by our moderator Gadarene? If so, it would seem it WAS an attempted murder alst night, and not a recruitment. Or did you actually mean “So I’m not saying one way or the other whether the Village Green was the scene if there was an attempted murder last night.”?
I’m afraid I don’t buy it, either. You’re extremely unlikely to have someone walk by you with a smoking gun in this game. You have to use what you have and I am not saying to blindly trust other players. If you don’t think the player who has the majority of the votes is guilty, don’t vote for them. But vote for someone; you have to have some sort of suspicions if you have been following the game at all. Keeping your head down and not voting may make the mafia overlook you, but it might get you lynched. Since you are looking more and more like you are not interested at all in helping the town, it stands to reason that you are not town.
I’m not changing my vote, but I am suspicious of you. Not for how you have voted, but because you have not voted.
Blastermaster I hope you are right about the attempted murder. It means that either the doctor or the nightwatchman got lucky, and the game is still (relatively) uncomplicated.
Omi No Kami I hate to say this but I agree with Blastermaster and Idle Thoughts on this. Posting your suspicions, FOS’s and voting is what the town needs. e.g. Kyrie seems to have been killed for targeting fluiddruid. Its likely the mafia didn’t know he was the Detective (or they’d have recruited). Any voting patterns, odd posts and other things need to be mentioned because otherwise if you die they will be lost.
No, it should be based on likelihoods and probabilities - vote, give your reasons and ask your target to respond. And by the way, don’t give too much weight to other people’s analysis - review the thread and post questions if that’s all you have. Eventually you will hit paydirt.
Also, if there are only 7 of 15 townies left, we don’t have a majority. If we can’t count on you voting unless someone’s standing in the corner, wearing a suit, holding a tommygun and speaking in a bad accent* under a sign saying “Mafia here” we’re down another vote.
*Have I introduced you to fluiddruid? It might be a costume but we aren’t sure.
I refer you to every fucking time I accused him, waited a few hours, got sick of his evasive defenses and retalitory FOSs and unvoted him to get rid of the headache.
