Exactly. And I stated in the beginning that yes, the punishment is annoying, but it's not game breaking, encumbering, distracting or malicious. It was a slap on the wrist to abide by the forum limitations of our medium to ensure fair play and no sneaky business. The whole shpeal that this was an abuse of power or whatever is laughable. This is a pretty mellow and friendly community of mostly working age adults with lives, families and other hobbies, mafia being another past time or hobby that they derive some pleasure from. Rules should not be this controversial and contentious given the fact they're pretty reasonable and accommodating.

I was just thinking that with all this complaining about this rule, it was right there in the first post. All anyone had to do was read it... Plus the punishment was pretty easy to comply with.

The biggest culture shock for me hasn't even been Rule #9 (that mentions the forum bug) or even that the day period does feel like it drags on for eternity. It really has been that the games here are extremely light on flavor to the extent that they feel stripped down. This isn't a complaint. I'm just making a point that new people need to adapt and become comfortable with how the game is played here, not demand that it be played the way they're used to.


edit - typo fix (I edited a post, but it would be okay now.)

It didn't use to be this way. Back when I started playing flavor was pretty heavy and almost an integral part of the game. Hints in flavor could tell people much about what was happening, though it would have to be relayed paraphrased to the rest. I miss it too. It took me a bit to get used to the lack of flavor compared to some 5-6 years ago.

I'll keep that in mind if I ever decide to run a game. :)

I'm basing this on your own posts in the game and the exchange with Dedo in the scum chat. Everyone else I've played with usually apologises immediately in the thread when they screw up a double post. They also try really hard not to do it again.

You on the other hand basically behaved as if the rule shouldn't apply to you because you don't agree with it. Different mafia communities have different values and you have to play by the rules of wherever you're playing. We know our mafia games are different from the way they play it elsewhere, but that's just variety.

You've essentially done the equivalent of the British tourist stereotype who goes to Spain in the summer and then complains that everyone is speaking Spanish and they can't find a fish and chip shop. Don't visit somewhere and spend the entire time complaining it's not like home.

I was really happy to have you in the game, but if you can't stand to play by the rules we have here then you are welcome to take your ball and go home as you seem to have already decided.

There were no replacements. We even lost a player just before the game started. If there had been a replacement Dedo would have brought them in then.

They didn't apologize, but they did make an effort to not double post again. It was the 3 posts ignoring the penalty that they were modkilled for.

That's not my point at all. The no editing rule isn't some quirk that Dedo came up with, all of our games for the last ten years have been like that.
But the penalty was essentially a second chance for what would have been a modkill for the edit.

The modkill was well deserved after multiple breaches of two rules. This is not a controversial topic. The controversial thing is that it took so many breaches for anything to happen or that someone pushed the boundaries so far that something had to happen.

No, but editing a post can be a crazy egregious event on the level of posting your PM and since the forum software is terrible there's no way for us to distinguish, hence the warning not to double post.
I haven't once suggested you were doing it on purpose, but that's not what unapologetic means.
Daychat is entirely at the mod's discretion here, it tends to be the exception rather than the rule. It's more like a special extra mechanic people occasionally bring out. Anyway, it's usually not a problem for the entire mafia team to make it through D1 unscathed and then plan properly on N1.
I've had plenty of disagreements with mods over decisions but I have never felt anyone bore a grudge towards me because of my protestations. If dedo was bearing a grudge (and that an if, because I don't see anything to show that's the case) then perhaps it wasn't because of the fact you protested, but the manner in which you did so. To put it bluntly, you've come across quite rude at times. That's not to say I think dedo did bear a grudge, but if he did I doubt it was because you challenged a decision.
Right. I can't remember the last time I saw a modkill for a post edit. Usually, the person just goes "Whoops, I double posted too quickly, sorry!" and everyone just moves on.

Yeah, I like to think D2 would have played out similarly if DK was still in the game, but I guess they might have NK'd someone pivotal to picking apart Micro's claim.

Nah, I think we would have managed it all the same.

I already looked for a replacement for RookieTerror. Any players that could have filled that spot had other stuff to attend to and weren't available for playing. If I had any options we would have been playing with 13 in the first place. That's why I clearly stated that I won't be replacing AZ but simply removing him from the game in case he failed to show up.

As for handling the mod-kills differently - I didn't change my mind between AZ and DK. The situation changed between them. Removing a player that hasn't even shown up effectively makes it as if the game started with one player fewer and some hit to the balance to a variable degree depending on which faction lost their member and what their role was. Also, the Mafia were already getting a free low-info kill on D1 they didn't have to respond for. AZ would have flipped in terms of alignment but not role.

Removing a player who has been active and have already made their mark on the game isn't the same, though. Also, at the point where I noticed what was happening it had become obvious scene is going down leaving DK the last surviving scum member. For the briefest of moments I actually considered turning a blind eye to the final few posts that didn't comply with the punishment and close the day as is because the game would have suffered otherwise and because it was Joe's friend but I gave up on that pretty much immediately as it would have meant preferential treatment which I consider unfair for everyone else.

DK has already made their mind on this so it's likely pointless to say any of this but there were no grudges nor detestation for their opinions at any point. I actually made extra effort to reach out to two players in this game - Catventurer, who unintentionally lied about her role so I PMed her to make sure she read correctly and knew what she was doing.

The other person was DK. In DK's case, in the beginning of the game, they were allowed a single post in the scum-chat to share their role and abilities with their buddy. That post was instead used to express their disagreement with the setup. Since this directly affected scene I allowed another post for the sake of proper info sharing.

Then came the post edits (three of them) which I warned about and politely asked to not do again or else. I feel "No one told me" isn't a good excuse as this particular bit is detailed in the rules which everyone has to read and understand and has been used as-is for I don't know how many years. Even so, as usual nothing more was done for a few posts other than warning the player as a first-timer that there would be consequences on repeated offense.

The fourth edit came near the end of the day. I had previously reached out to DK with a request to participate in the final hours of the game as they had been missing for a while, the day was ending and scene was taking a beating.

DK came in and eventually made the final post edit. Instead of acting immediately in the game-thread I once more reached out directly and asked if DK was planning to make an effort to avoid doing this or not. I was hoping for a response along the lines of "Oh, shit, I'm sorry! It won't happen again, I promise!" but all I got was "Are you sure I didn't do it on purpose?". This was what forced my hand as it no longer looked like an honest mistake but it was either done intentionally for whatever reason or they simply didn't care to try. The exchange happened in real-time, so did the post that contained a direct ping-quote and applied the punishment (the post was written within a minute of that "fine" DM).

On top of thepost with the public announcement, by the end of the day there have been a few cote counts, each of which contained the information about the restriction. We even cross-posted as I didn't immediately noticed DK had made new posts.

Until then there were no grudges or anything held against DK because of their beliefs and opinions on what was fair and what wasn't. Everything they said was noted and acknowledged and that was it. As a mod it's my role to handle such questions and situations and I take full responsibility for my decisions. If someone isn't happy with them and think something else makes more sense, that's fine but it doesn't mean it would be automatically accepted or used. Nor it means they would get any hate for it.

As for DK's lack of any flip information, I believe it should be pretty apparent by now why I went this way. Even though some people thought at the time this decision benefits the mafia team it only benefited what was left of the game as a whole. Neither the Town, nor the SK had more information that the other because of it and that was the whole point. I never meant to handle all mod-kills the same way but I never really planned to have to have to handle ANY mod-kills whatsoever.

DK, you say this is the worst game you have participated in because of the way you were mod-killed. I say this is the first time I have ever had to mod-kill anyone for not following game rules. As a matter of fact I don't really remember when was the last time this happened at all so this probably also says something.

Once more, I didn't and don't hold any grudges and I'm sorry this went the way it did but I won't apologize for it, either. No one is more special than anyone else here to warrant for special treatment. I like to think we are all friends to get together and have some fun after we've been dealing with the BS we have to in RL. It has been working for pretty much everyone so far. If it doesn't work for you it's a damn shame but unless we can't meet somewhere in the middle it won't really work in the long run anyway. At least that's how I feel about things.

That's everything I have to say on the matter.
PS: I have listened to every one of the listed songs as this was a nice little way to learn a bit more about the player's RL selves. If anyone is interested in a consolidated list with links to youtube let me know.

Wow. The game is already over? Flawless too without any Town death. That never happened before! But then scum was never wiped out on D1 either. It was very unfortunate that half the Mafia team got themselves modkilled and the other half way lynched.

@Micro: did you actually have no kill in N1? Or did you forget to submit one?

About the setup: it was a very swingy setup, as role madness tends to be. With three killing roles and Lovers potentially increasing the kill count by one, this could have easily swung the other way. But it was fun while it lasted. Thank you for hosting, dedo!


By the way, for the first time in my personal Mafia history I breadcrumbed my role. Did anyone notice? Or was it hidden enough?

That's actually a good point. Whenever I pop into a thread, I usually just skim. It's not far fetched that the restriction was not spotted during a skim and the fate of the Mafia, or rather the entire game, has been sealed. A PM is front and center and hard to ignore. On another, I just read dedo's big post and he did ping quote right after a bunch of DMs.

I know culture clash has bitten you severely in the butt this game, but I still believe you can have a second chance with my upcoming game. With the knowledge of how GOG's amazing forum software works, I think it might work out just better. (If it helps any, all my games have daychats, I personally hate nightchat setups*).


*this is something more general than just this game, but with a nightchat I have to put in the active effort to use it as much as can be used before the night ends, which is kind of stressful, and I can't really communicate to my partner(s) in real time to better coordinate ourselves, only hope we somehow survive up to N1 and then coordinate for D2 with mostly static ideas of how it would play out except that's also not how it works because Forum Mafia is Fucking Unpredictable™️, and also if my partners don't feel the same level of commitment to the nightchat that I do, then it's pretty much wasted. I remember one time having to wait hours for someone (I think GR) to show up and read my scumchat ramblings, and IIRC that was even a daychat. Maybe I've been spoiled by playing several games with daychat and appreciating just how much more dynamic scum is.

He didn't have one. To balance the game.

Yeah, for sure. If we mislynched, Dk made nothing to get modkilled and mafia kills lovers, we are suddenly at 6 townies VS 2 mafia VS 1 SK, very different situation.
I would love to see situation where mafia attempt to NK serial killer and now they have to figure out why it failed, how to get rid of him, while he needs to kill them at the same time. But such setup can go many way nad well, this time it went with mafia dying D1.

I have not but I never look for them. Even now when I do quick skim of your posts, I don't see it.
There is a reason why I don't like them at all. :-)
What was it?

It seems to be cultural thing. :-) I played dozens of games and by my estimate, they were 2, that had daychat, so for me, when I encountered it, it was something strange and unheard of. I treated it as special thing and not something I should expect and thus I don't even miss it. You can consider it one of mafia skills, when you are able to communicate with your mafia buddies only at Night, you have to formulate plan for next Day and during the Day you can only guess what are they going for and act according to it. I find it preferable to when you can just share your every thought and action. Things like coordinated voting to quickhammer are certainly more thrilling without it.
There even used to exist the role, I think it was chatterbox, that gave mafia special ability to talk during Day. That person could be town and if they died, no more daychat. I find it intriguing and it treated dachat as advantage which I agree with.

This only works if your team acts in lockstep with itself all without a central point of communication. So you need your other mafiosos to have the same brain wavelength as you and the same time commitments. Unfortunately, this dream scumteam is only going to happen in very few games, if Lady Luck was ever so gracious with you. This downside will occur with more games than the upside of "we did all this without day communication."

Nightchats are dying (or already dead) in every other community I know of for good reasons. Personally, I appreciate that daychats respect real life commitments and are open 24/7 instead of just 48 hours, and I'll take that over anything else.