OK, here we go. Since my preferred choice - cowering silently in the corner - is unlikely to yield any useful information, I’m going to wade back in here and hope something good comes of it.
First, on the subject of last night’s kill (and today’s survivors). I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and what I think is that this particular avenue is not going to be useful, because that evidence is evidence that has been given to us by an untrustworthy source. Consider: we know that StarvingButStrong expressed suspicion of Lakai toward the end of yesterday; the Mafia might have killed her to cut off that inquiry (if Lakai is Mafia). But if Lakai is not, then killing StarvingButStrong might have been an attempt to divert suspicion onto an innocent Lakai. Or it might have been an attempt to widen the town’s net - to make us consider more suspects by making people wonder why Queuing and I are still alive, thus reducing our chance of hitting Mafia. Or it might have been an attempt to hide the fact that either Queuing or I (or both) are Mafia (I know I’m not, but the remaining town can’t know that). In short, the Night events could easily be consistent with just about any combination of remaining Mafia, which means they tell us precisely nothing at all. Worse yet, if we base our lynching decisions to any significant extent on Night results, we are basing our choice on evidence that has been handpicked for delivery by the very people who want us to choose poorly - evidence that they can now spin any way they want to during the Day according to whatever they planned at Night. We have imperfect information, which means we have no hope of confidently interpreting the Night-time actions of those who have perfect information.
Which is my long-winded way of saying that I am much more interested in looking at people’s daytime posts as potential indicators.
Pursuant to that, I’ll start by saying that Fretful Porpentine has said and done several things that have seemed odd to me, just this game Day. In her two brief analysis posts of today, she has focused entirely on what happened last night. In the first, at 3586, she pronounces it “almost certain” that either Queuing or I is Mafia - as I noted above, I find it impossible to make a statement like that based on last night’s results alone. Then, finding little traction on that path, she tries to draw attention to Lakai on the basis, again, of what happened at Night - positing that SbS was night-killed because she was after Lakai (post 3862). Couple that with what I say here and I have concerns. BUT. Fretful also refrained from voting for brewha when doing so would have resulted in an insta-lynch, then jumped on brewha’s bandwagon to ensure the eventual lynch. If she was Mafia and her primary concern was distancing herself from the lynch of a townie, why do the latter? If she was Mafia and her primary concern was getting a townie lynched, why do the former? That sequence of actions mitigates against what I’ve said so far; to what extent I don’t yet know.
The town as a whole has been somewhat suspicious of Lakai for some time. Honestly, I wasn’t feeling it even a little bit until fairly recently. I think his actions with regard to the brewha vote look very strange to me - early on the bandwagon, then jumps off almost literally at the last possible second? This could easily be interpreted as the act of someone who got the job done - getting brewha killed - and now wanted to put a little distance between himself and the act. BUT. His actions today have been very considered and careful so far - given where we stand in the game, I was thinking the Mafia might tip their hands by being too aggressive, pushing for an early or an easy lynch. So again, I don’t know.
Kat - I know I said I’d do a Kat post history, and I will genuinely try to do so but am worried I won’t have enough time. Someone want to split the job with me? In any case, unless I find any glaring inconsistencies in her record, it seems like a vote for Kat would be very nearly random, which is not what I want to be doing at this point.
And then there is Queuing. For the very first time since the Day 2 conflagration, Queuing said something today that made me feel a twinge of suspicion - namely, that if we are certain that Lakai is Mafia, we shouldn’t vote for him, but rather try to break up the Kat / Fretful pairing. I strongly disagree with this, at this stage of the game. If we become certain about Lakai, we should lynch him (same if we become certain, or nearly certain, about anyone) immediately. This will have the benefit of removing his potentially misleading contributions and vote from tomorrow’s discussion, plus eliminate the chance of an instant game-over if we guess wrong between Fretful and Kat. This proposition by Queuing would make incredible sense if he and Lakai were the last Mafia. Push us to lynch either Fretful or Kat, knowing that they are both town, and that whichever we choose, we’re done.
That said, this seems a little fanciful. I realize that I’ve more or less cast my lot with Queuing here, but his body of work is so pro-town that I feel the same about him as I do about Kat - a vote for him would be a shot in the dark, comparatively speaking.
So I guess for me right now it’s between Lakai and Fretful, with Kat a possible third candidate pending further investigation.
Finally: I very strongly agree with Lakai’s suggestion that we wait to place even a single vote until we have a town-wide consensus on a target.
