Mafia: The Thrill of the Chase [Newbie Friendly!]

[Silver_Jan]

@MentalGuy

I just noticed that Day 2 shows two different votes for Svejk. He never actually unvoted Scathach when he voted for Inner Stickler. Trepa is apparently assuming the unvote when you revote. I won’t repost it now, but will correct it for later.

After going back and looking at Scathach’s vote on gnarlycharlie, I am leaning Town on her. She was the first vote and does make a genuine case.

I’m sorry to see guiri go, he is a really good player, even though I don’t usually get what he is asking when he questions people.

That’s a new one on me, counting an unvote even when there wasn’t one, that could have changed the outcome of D2.

I still think choie could be scum although I am wavering a bit (a lot), it could just be her playing style and she does mention that she is Town quite often. The only thing that I felt that was really scummy was her case on Inner but she has tried to explain that so I have nothing solid to go on.

I wonder if the Vig/SK did try and target Septimus last night and the kill didn’t go through? The colour seems to indicate that a 2nd kill was tried but was that just “colour”?

When I first saw** Fubbles** role I was very skeptical about it and then I went and had a look at the wiki and it is apparently a “real” role, I felt a bit bad after that. My prime suspect has a real, if very odd, role.

I don’t know what to think about the slight difference in** Septimus**’ PM, maybe Trepa did change all of them slightly. We didn’t see Astrals PM
so we don’t really know what was different about it. The subject line of mine said “Role PM(mafia)” and I just took it to mean that it was the subject of the PM.

[Scathach]

@septimus

As to why my PM has an oddity, I don’t know what to say. Perhaps Trepa changed the format to prevent handshaking. All I know is I copied my PM exactly.

I will note that my role pm says neither Role PM (town) or Role PM (mafia) . It’s phrased a different way. So I’m willing to assume that PM’s are all slightly different in order to prevent handshaking.

[fubbleskag]

@Scathach

I will note that my role pm says neither Role PM (town) or Role PM (mafia) . It’s phrased a different way. So I’m willing to assume that PM’s are all slightly different in order to prevent handshaking.

what does it say, though?

[Scathach]

@fubbleskag

what does it say, though?

Is there a good reason to say? I’m not sure what it would add.

[fubbleskag]

@Scathach

Is there a good reason to say? I’m not sure what it would add.

Is there a good reason not to say. I mean, aside from the fact that you could be scum claiming a nebulous third option for your PM in order to help cover up your compatriot’s earlier blunder?

[choie]

Yeah, I gotta admit I don’t see a reason not to share just the title of your PM.

(I also don’t see what it’d help, to be honest–anything any of us says could be a lie. But being a refusnik on this issue doesn’t really make sense.)

@septimus

I did self-protect again last Night. I wavered between myself and guiri, but with Players voicing suspicion about me, I had both Scum and the Vig to worry about, so I chose to self-protect.

Doesn’t this go against your Hippocratic oath? Seriously, if you’re not going to protect anyone but yourself, what value is your role? At least plain ol’ vanilla Guiri contributed a great deal to the ongoing investigation into scumhood. All you’re doing is not utilizing the powers vested in you by Trepa.

[septimus]

@choie

And for that matter, isn’t [Fubbles’] claiming this now, only just after Night began, rather anti-Town? … Now, claiming just after Night falls, means that he’s told scum early on, “don’t waste time trying to kill me, I’m immune,” which basically renders his role useless?

…Which is exactly what happened with septimus, as a matter of fact. What the hell is with these supposed power roles and their determination to protect themselves more than Town?

At the time I posted my role PM, I was well in the lead for Lynch and, away from home with busy errands to do, would not have been able to post again until near EOD. A revealed Doc is better than a dead Doc!

@choie

[QUOTE=septimus]
I did self-protect again last Night. I wavered between myself and guiri, but with Players voicing suspicion about me, I had both Scum and the Vig to worry about, so I chose to self-protect.

Doesn’t this go against your Hippocratic oath? Seriously, if you’re not going to protect anyone but yourself, what value is your role? At least plain ol’ vanilla Guiri contributed a great deal to the ongoing investigation into scumhood. All you’re doing is not utilizing the powers vested in you by Trepa.
[/QUOTE]

I certainly hope to force Scum to waste at least one of their NK attempts. (Good luck or good guessing will be needed for me to cause them to waste two or more NK’s.) Even though guiri was “just” vanilla, he’s a very good player and I’d certainly have Protected him last Night if I were confident he’d be the likely NK target. But how could I be sure? Scum hadn’t targeted him earlier … which was one reason I wasn’t even 100% sure he was Town.

And there was talk during the Day that Vig should Kill me! :smack: If you think I’m a liability as Doc, please just Lynch me. If, OTOH, Townies want Vig to target me to test whether I am the Doc, obviously I’ll need to know or I won’t know whether to self-Protect or not. I hope for a discussion toDay in which we reach a consensus on whether or not Vig should test/target me toNight.

For a few reasons you are on my suspect list, choie, and these comments about me add to my suspicion.

[choie]

Ooh, our neutered doctor suspects me! I’m a-quakin’ in my boots. The thing is, I don’t care if I’m lynched–except insofar as my lynching means another non-scum goes down, which is bad for us overall. But if it helps town to lynch me, informationally speaking, then I’m willing to take that bullet. Or, um, noose.

The thing is, you’re no more use to Town than I am unless you sack up and one of these Nights do your darn job. For two Nights we’ve assumed you’d protect yourself, and you did, and as far as I know the Scum team have no reason to doubt that you’re self-protecting either. Obviously you shouldn’t tell us which Night you’re going to do your duty, but do your duty you must, at some point. Otherwise you’re basically no better than fubbles here, who’s got kind of a craven sort of role.

And even if you do self-protect as you have been, you should be using all your smarts and experience (you’re no newbie at this game) to help scumhunt.

I admit it: I don’t trust you, septimus, and your unwillingness to defend an allegedly fellow Townie of such obvious worth as Guiri–even at risk to yourself–is only one reason why. Other reasons are your lack of substantive scumhunting and the aforementioned oddity in your role PM subject (the latter is the least of my worries, since again, I don’t think role PM subects are usually identical in SDMB games.

Also, btw, how do you know there’s a Vig? I don’t remember our getting confirmation of that. :dubious: So far both second deaths have been of Townies. While I know that’s not proof positive of a SK vs. Vig (especially this early on, when a Vig is more likely to hit Town than Scum), I think we need to keep our minds open and not assume we’re fortunate enough to have a Vig playing for our team. We’ve already had a confirmed Bodyguard and a Cop, as well as an alleged Hider and Doctor. Is it likely to have a fifth pro-Town role in a game with only 21 players? (I ask sincerely here, I really don’t know what’s likely in a newbie-friendly game of this size.)

(If there’s a vig and s/he hasn’t yet killed precambrianmollusc, I’d like to know what the heck s/he’s waiting for! Seriously, Trepa, can you give this guy a nudge, if you haven’t yet?)

[Svejk_1]

I wanted to get a feel for how scum and town would stack up against each other as teams, so I input a number of scenarios using JSexton’s scheme (here). I realize that **Trepa **may not have used these points exactly when putting together the game, but she must have used something to balance both sides out. At any rate, we know that we had a Cop and a Bodyguard. There are claims that we have a Doctor and a Hider. Then there clearly is a player in the game who has night kill capacity, in addition to the scum night kill. It might be a vig, it might be a serial killer. Let’s say it is a vig, and that both **fubbles **and **septimus **have claimed rightly, then the point scheme looks like this:

**TOWN**
Cop - 4
Bodyguard - 2
Hider - 2
Doctor - 3
Vig - 2.5
10 Vanilla Town - 10
-------------------------+
23.5 points

**SCUM**
4 Goon - 18
Godfather - 7
------------------------+
25 points

If, on the other hand, **fubbles **and **septimus **are lying, and the second night-kill is a serial killer, then the setup might look more like this:

**TOWN**
Cop - 4
Bodyguard - 2
13 Vanilla Town - 13
--------------------------+
19 points

**SCUM**
4 Goons - 18
-------------------------+
18 points

**PFK**
Serial Killer 

So a couple of thoughts:

• I guess there’s various options in between (replace a town power role with a townie; reduce the godfather to regular scum), and that is even assuming that this is the schema used for the game. Typing this up I realize that this exercise has only limited validity.
• as **Trepa **has stated (quotes below), the game was supposed to be simple. Now I don’t know what that means, is five scum, five town power roles, and ten vanilla town still simple?
• still, I guess it’s possible numerically for town to have all these power roles - but it would almost certainly mean that there are still 4 scum out there, one of which is a godfather. IIRC, though, the power of a godfather is to not be detected by a cop, so since our cop is dead that would essentially reduce a GF to regular scum, isn’t that right?
• People have been talking about masons - my feeling is there aren’t any because we probably would have accidentally lynched one of them by now :smack: If there are masons, however, and the scheme used to balance this game is remotely like what I used above, then either we don’t have a vig or one or both of **fubbles **and septimus is lying, because otherwise the game is totally out of whack.

@Trepa_Mayfield

Hey, everybody, I decided to make a mafia game again! This one should be relatively simple (given past games). Just players, secrets, and my laughable attempts at writing like a Harlequin Romance novelist. For those who haven’t played the game before, here’s a basic tutorial; you should try it out, it’s a blast.

@Trepa_Mayfield

There’s no crazy offbeat mechanics, no power-roles that could never be anticipated (except maybe one, as mentioned before) and no hidden information that’s separate from the main game. You’d think that’s typical, but around here it’s not.

[Trepa_Mayfield]

Vote Count:
septimus (2): Hirka T’Bawa, fluiddruid

[Scathach]

@choie

Yeah, I gotta admit I don’t see a reason not to share just the title of your PM.

(I also don’t see what it’d help, to be honest–anything any of us says could be a lie. But being a refusnik on this issue doesn’t really make sense.)

Well fair enough - I had a vague idea it might give away information but really I can’t think of any use it would be to anyone.

Brace yourself for this - it’s shocking…

My role pm title was…

Role PM

:o

[choie]

@Scathach

Well fair enough - I had a vague idea it might give away information but really I can’t think of any use it would be to anyone.

Brace yourself for this - it’s shocking…

My role pm title was…

Role PM

:o

Consternation! Uproar! OMG total scum-tell! vote Scathach!!!

(Just kidding. Thanks for adding to the info pot. :))

[Scathach]

Actually I am beginning to be wooed over to your way of thinking on Septimus. No one else has said they have “Role PM (town)” yet, (although we have a sizeable portion of lurkers I guess, so one of them might). And I can see how a mafioso would think that “Role PM (mafia)” applied to their alignment and so change it when fake role-claiming.

But then it may be a bit tinfoil hat - I must do a reread of the voting patterns.

[Svejk_1]

I think that the kill was blocked (rather than not carried out). This is inspired in part by Trepa’s comment that “(…) the second victim of the night proved to not actually be a victim at all! That is to say, not dead. That is to say, alive. Yay, life!” (here). But also, it’s because it would appear that whoever is behind the first two extra night-kills (probably the lurkers, **gregorio **and orcenio) still had one lurker left to take out - PCM, who disappeared. Why decide not to use your killing power, all of a sudden, when there is still a good candidate? Perhaps it’s one of those vigs who only has limited powers, or a remorseful, but how likely is that, given again that this game is supposed to be simple? This would indicate that a kill was tried and failed, which in turn would suggest that someone (possibly fubbles or septimus, since 1) they claimed, making themselves targets; 2) they both say they hid/self-protected) dodged a bullet. To me, it is evidence that there is at least one person in the game who has the power to avoid being killed.

Now **fubbles **announced during the night, all of a sudden, and very early, seeing as there had not even been the option of voting for him, and seeing as the problems that people had with him were quite mild (in my recollection at least, but fubbles agrees at least with regard to SilverJan’s accusations, as he calls them weak straw-grasping). If he had not claimed, a more straightforward case could be made that a vig had tried to take out a self-protecting septimus, lending more credence to his claim that he is a town doctor. The timing of fubbles’s claim (during the night, when vig, sk, and scum can still change their minds on who to take out) is odd to me. It would appear that **fubbles **put himself at risk if he really is a hider, *and *that he made things needlessly complicated for town. **Fubbles **gets called out on his timing by choie, but does not respond. Later, he claims that '(post #947) he was ‘tired of defending [him]self’ - but I don’t feel that he had been doing a whole lot of defending at that point, which makes me think that his claim, prompted so easily, was in fact a way of throwing sand into the (admittedly poorly functioning) town-machine, confusing us and making things needlessly complicated.

The late **Guiri **points out (here) that ‘Between the abstain, the attack on Mahaloth, the handshake attempt, the smilies, the evasiveness, voting the doc, the self-vote with its strained logic, and the claim’, fubbles mostly seems to have been attracting day-time votes, when he should have been attracting night-time kills so that scum would waste a kill on him, eg by trying to look like a power role. If there’s any night-kill he would have been trying to attract, it would probably be a town-aligned vig.

I find all of this highly suspicious and I don’t believe fubbles’s claim. At the same time, I am leaning towards thinking that 1) Septimus *is *in fact the doctor; 2) that a vig tried to kill him and failed, which is why we had only one night-kill last Night. Problem here is, that **Septimus **had not announced he would be self-protecting during N3 like he had before N2; it seems like a big risk for a vig to take. So perhaps there is something else going on here that I am missing. At any rate, my suspicion of **Fubbleskag **stands, so without further ado:

vote fubbleskag

[Svejk_1]

I think it’s nonsense to be sharing role PMs since there is every reason to believe that they have been altered to prevent such sharing from being useful in any way. Mine was Role PM (mafia), FWIW, but I really don’t believe that Septimus’s role PM title says anything about the truthfulness of his claim. And besides, even if I was scum and had some other title, by now so many have claimed just what I pasted into my post above that I could just be copying them. Even if there are identical role PMs, it only helps the first person who posts it, all other information sharing is completely irrelevant.

[Mahaloth]

For some reason, the Dope has not been loading for me at work. It isn’t blocked, but I just get the “waiting” forever message on the bottom of my browser. Started Friday and continued today.

Anyway, I’ve read the Day and my suspicions remain the same. However, I have to admit that Svejk’s case on fubbles is quite convincing. I already voted fubbles on Day One and he is third on my suspect list, but Svejk is making me reconsider. Hmmm…

Well, I like getting a vote out there anyway. I may switch over to fubbles or ed later, but choie is earning my placeholder vote for now. Still my number one suspect, though fubbles is definitely 2nd now(perhaps first when I think more).

Vote Choie

I think the following are scum, in this order:

1. Choie
2. Fubbles
3. Special Ed

Same suspects as before.

[Mahaloth]

Uh, I didn’t vote there it appears.

Vote Choie

[Svejk_1]

Mahaloth, I’m just not seeing it. I’ve collected all three posts below where you talk about choie and your suspicions of her, in addition to the one above. My apologies if I’ve missed something, but all you come up with is “It’s her tone, I think. Very light, supportive, making casual comment on others. I think she’s scum hiding in play sight. Anyway, it’s early. I’m voting to get it out there.” Of course, you never changed your mind during D3, even though you were the first to vote. Later you say: “I think choie has changed a bit since my vote, which looks like trying to self-correct/hide”, but offer little to substantiate that claim. You also don’t like **Ed **and Fubbles, for reasons that are even more nebulous to me. Am I missing something? Can you explain why you suspect choie and have now voted for her again?

@Mahaloth

I still suspect ed, and to a certain extent fubble, but you know who has pinged me quite a bit?

Choie.

It’s her tone, I think. Very light, supportive, making casual comment on others. I think she’s scum hiding in play sight. Anyway, it’s early. I’m voting to get it out there.

Vote choie

@Mahaloth

I’ve had little to say this Day because my suspicion has not changed. Also, I think choie has changed a bit since my vote, which looks like trying to self-correct/hide.

Is it in anyway anti-town to list our suspect list in order? Anyway, my current suspect list from most scummy down is:

1. Choie - play-style
2. Special Ed - play-style
3. Fubble - actually, I suspected Fubble before being insulted/attacked, so I kind of wonder if that was a huge distraction attempt by fubble. If so, not my preferred play-style, but possible. However, still 3rd for me.

@Mahaloth

Wow. Gnarly was not on my suspect list at all. I guess because he suspected me. Good one, everyone.

I still maintain my suspect list though.

1. Choir
2. Ed
3. Fubble

[choie]

I gotta admit I’m a bit curious too, Svejk, but I’m sure there’ll be reasons that probably do make sense. Heck I can enumerate a few good ones: I made a lengthy case for lynching Inner though he turned out to be Town, I’m needling our putative Doc, and didn’t see the case against gnarlycharlie. There may be others that I’m mising.

What’s odd is that none of these are the reasons he’s given. Just my “tone.” Geeze, if I can come up with more legit reasons not to trust me, why can’t he?! C’mon, dude, don’t make me do all your homework!

Anyway, once I finish editing a manuscript I’m going to create a chart that I used last game (and which I mentioned early in the game here). It’s basically just a list of everyone’s votes, just like most lists but mine is categorized more by person than by Day.

[choie]

Sorry to double post (maybe it wouldn’t have been a double-post if y’all weren’t being so quiet…) but as I was working on my chart, I got up to the Day 2 section and sort of had a mini-revelation. Maybe.

1. septimus, after he claimed Doc, invited the Vig to shoot at him to prove he’s really a doctor.

2. Night happens.

3. Astral Rejection is dead, clearly by the scum. Oh, and orcenio is killed.

4. Why on earth wouldn’t the Vig have tested septimus’s claim? This would have helped us quite a bit (although not so much if septimus is some scum bulletproof role).

5. Likely answer: Because the shooter didn’t want to waste a bullet to help Town prove anything.

6. More specific answer: Because s/he wanted to shoot at someone so the death would definitely happen. Even if the death was more likely to hit Town than Scum so early in the game.

7. Conclusion: We don’t have a Vig. We have a Serial Killer. Q.E.D.

Thoughts?