If it is Town vs Town, as it might well be, it could be a terrible plan. After both are removed from the game, also two of the most cleared players will be removed as well, reducing the cleared/suspect ratio.
So, we better pick our shots well.

On the other hand...

Right now, no one is acting in an anti-town way more openly than JoeSapphire, for the reasons stated above.

There were several options for scum after last Night:

a) Play it safe (this leads mostly to doom, unless Town is very unlucky).
b) Do as explained before and try to thin the number of the Cleared during the Day by all means possible.
c) Something else.

Option c) seemed more logical, even if requires a bolder approach. However, anyone half-awake could think of this, really. So going straight for it right away should raise alarm inmediately.
Thence the disappointment: after having been expecting a tough endgame, Scum3 goes to the open too soon, and their profile fits the bill. There is this big mine and it has been squarely stepped on. KABOOM. There goes the endgame, Alas (if it is true that Scum3 is the last remaining hostile).

Would love to be wrong with this and that it was all weird gameplay as Town, but, by all appearences, it is to be feared that Scum3 is JoeSapphire, and JoeSapphire is Scum3 :-(

______________

On the other hand, it might be most amusing that player #3 was Scum3, just like the other two scummies were #1 and #2 :-)

Trent seems a valid train, Pooka I've doubted since D1 when he forgot my many PMs on the subject, Carradice thinks Joe extraordinarily bad. All 3 are valid.

I want Joppo & Caesar to decide before I do anything much.

Vote Count

trent 2 - Pooka, Lift
Pooka 2 - trent, Joe
Joe 1 - Carradice

Not voting - GameRager, Caesar, Micro, joppo, agent

10 Players. Takes 6 to lynch.

But if one is scum, then we could win the game easily.

Also most cleared by whom? You? Even though I consider you near certain to be town that(to me) seems like an unwise idea(that lock town or those close to it should have their picks hold more weight because of that status as lock town/close to lock town).

I GET you suspect Joe, but what if they don't get enough votes before deadline AND your vote could keep us from a nolynch....would you stick to that vote even then and not help us to get a lynch and possibly get scum(if your idea on Joe is wrong and he's town or neutral, that is)?

I just saw that....yeah it'd be odd....but I don't think OP would make it that easy.....he might've thrown in a wild card(like make player 3 a neutral/etc).
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So say we lynch Trent(if we do that)....who would we go after next if they turn out to be town or neutral? Pooka, Joe(as Carradice thinks), someone else that's posted little?

Let us introduce what is new in the spreadsheet.

Have been thinking about this and made an example with matrices on a jupyter notebook, so that those interested might better follow WHENCE the numbers come from. Using matricial product, the explanation is rather elegant. However, in the end, it seems best to provide the numbers with a layman's explanation, and leave the thorough one for those interested, later.

So, novelties: first, to the right of the first table, the Controversy colum. It is simply the variance of the opinions about someone. The less Controversy, the more homogeneous are opinions about someone.

Then, the big novelties: in the second image, see the IDAHO matrix, and below, the Trust matrix. The Trust matrix is simply how much you trust someone, meaning 1-p, with p being what everyone is submitting, the estimated probability of someone being hostile to Town.

What is the IDAHO matrix? Let us go step by step: Imagine that we make an average of all opinions on someone, but it is not a regular average. Instead, we make a weighted average. Weighted with what? Good question: weighted with the degree of trust that you have for each one posing their opinion. That means that confirmed scum get zero input, and an innocent child gets full input, relative to the rest, and a 0,5 gets 0,5 input, relative to an IC.

Remember the movie My own private Idaho? what you see under the columns in pink in the upper matrix of the second image is YOUR OWN PRIVATE IDAHO. Meaning, the average on the opinions of people, with more weight for the people you trust the most to be Town. You search the column and what appears is an average of the readings, customized for your. The serious name of this matrix is the Trust-Weighted Matrix, if you prefer that. All the private Idahos, together, make the Idaho matrix.

Then you can get an average of all that, which appears to the right, plus another Controversy column. Ta-da.

The examples attached are from the last data from D2, so that we can compare. In the next post, the same data, BUT with the suspicion matrix UPDATED with what we do know in D4: Meaning, two scum and an innocent child. This is so that you can compare.

Will be compiling data and hopefully Caesar and Joppo can provide more input as well, so that we have a proper D4 spreadsheet.

Please bump if you can...

____________________

T H E O RY (for those willing to enter the rabbit hole; read at your own peril)

Let us call

M the matrix with the players's input, with the elements being pij, meaning the opinion of player j about the suspect i
T the matrix whose elements are 1-pij
n the number of suspects
m the number of players providing input with their estimations
(if all players are being considered, the matrix M is squared and n,m = 14)

The average suspicion is obtained post-multiplying the suspicion matrix (M) by an equal-weight column vector which has all elements equal to 1/n, with n being the total number of suspects (as you know, in order to make a weighted average, you can build any weight vector assigning relative weights manually and then dividing by the sum of all the relative weights)

But lets us use the Trust matrix:

The Trust-Weighted (Mtw) Idaho matrix is M post-multiplied by T

M*T = Mtw


But M can also be weighted with the Skill that you think that each player has for detecting scum and clearing townies. All those Skill weights, put together, make the Skill matrix (S).

And you would obtain a Skill-weighted suspicion matrix (Msw) customized for each participant in the same way:

M*S = Msw

Actually, nothing prevents us from combining the two weights, if we wish to do that: taking into account the Skill of each player and the degree of Trust that we have for them. Thence we obtain the Trust and Skill weighted Suspicion Matrix (Mtsw).

M*T*S = Mtsw

Why stop here? Probably you might have reflected that some people can read this or that player better than they can read others, or the opposite (when someone is someone else's kryptonite). This means that we might assign to each player a different degree of skill when reading each particular player.

M*T*Sj

And if we are to consider that each player might have a different opinion of each other's skill when evaluating each of the other players, we end up with a three-dimensional array, that, if all players are being considered, will bear the shape of a CUBE.

Not using the Skill matrices nor the Cube, currently, but it could be done. At least you have been entertained, hopefully (and your sanity checked only slightly ;-)

CORRECTION: Where it says

T the matrix whose elements are 1-pij

It should read:

T the matrix whose elements are 1-pij normalized by columns.


___________

@GR: "Cleared" is a 0 in suspicion, or a 1 in trust (as you prefer to write). "Most Cleared" means those with higher trust (and less suspicion). By using the word "Most", a relative, not absolute quality, is to be inferred.

Not locking anyone absolutely besides the IC, not even GR (although Agent and then GR have won lots of Town credit due to circumstance), but certainly there are different plateaus well above the rest in suspicion, and a group that is certainly "less cleared".


@GR: Let us say that we give Caesar and Joppo the chance to provide more input tomorrow. Else we would be actually punishing Trent&Pooka&Joe for participating during the weekend, and that does not sounds fair nor sensible for Town.

Does that sound better? =)


By the way, good post by LIft. Very rational, as expected.

@ConsulCaesar: good to hear that the travel was a good one.

@Pooka: Outrun is indeed great fun

@Trent: hoping you are not the first to be processed. It would be nice that you turned out to be a townie.

Er....
:blobsweat.jpg:
I have no idea what was in some of Carradice's posts above....

May we please still have the Upper (long) spreadsheet and also a Fitted (short; ie no opinions from removed players) sheet, each with avg and weighted heats?

(Can we then get different horses or cars to run in the different heats? j/k)

Will 1 still be high suspicion?

missing word here?

Also, what is the avg and variance for, and what is the significance of the colors used?


Thanks!
-------------------------------
@CAESAR
Glad the Trip went well & was enjoyable!

Why not? I was just stressing the point that we probably don't have a Cop anymore.

Yes, the odds are in our favour. But that's no reason to become complacent and drop our guard. But yes, lynching the most scummy player, like usual, is the plan. However, I'm not a fan of automatisms. So no 'lynch Trent first and then lynch Pooka'. As I said, there is also the chance that the real scum is hiding in minimal activity which leads to minimal conflict. Also keep in mind that we don't really know whether there's one or two scum or one scum and one neutral.

So, let's put together what possible tells there are for which players. Carradices matrices are one way. But I'd like to collect reasons to suspect scumminess in the more traditional way.

The arguments against trent have been made repeatedly and they are solid. If he is Town, then he is indeed unlucky in his association with yogs and was too stubborn in an unfortunate way in his pursuit of Micro. And also very petty in his statement that he would prefer Scum to win over Town!Pooka to win.

Joe: he seems all over the place with his votes and holding back enough that the theory that he is scum just going with the flow seems valid.
@Carradice: why are you so sure that Joe is scum, that you even said that you lock your vote to him? And I think you haven't yet replied to GR concerning this vote-lock!

Consul: one of my points against him was his association with agent - that point is moot. What remains is some serious LAMIST moments, which may be due to newbieness. And low presence - which seems to be due to RL. Also a general feeling that something is off.

Pooka: it is possible that trent is right. Pooka pushed a very weak theory and he felt scummy on and off all game. However, I really don't have anything solid enough to put him in my top spot. Here I am still waiting for an explanation by agent, why he prefers Pooka over trent.
However, there is one bit pointed out by Joe that actually reads strange on second reading:
@Pooka: how do you know that trent doesn't know if there was a Night 0 chat? And how does that fit with your theory that he is scum? If you believe trent to be scum you should assume that he knows whether he had a N0 chat or not!

Joppo: had him as towny for most of the game. But he kind of flies under the radar. Could be very skillfully played scum. Really hard to read!


So, lynching trent is a valid path. As he himself observed, if we don't lynch him today, he will continue to be a main suspect tomorrow. Scum won't NK him for sure, if he is Town. He's a too good distraction and they have 4 mostly confirmed players to choose from. So maybe it is in our best interest to eliminate him. Especially since I still think that he has a good likelihood of actually being scum.

However, I do want those answers from agent, Pooka and Carradice as well as some input from Consul and Joppo before we decide for good.

Actually GR's question has been answered in this message addressed to him, in #1026

Translation: before making final decisions, we all ought to take into consideration what ALL of us say or do not say.

It has been brought to the attention of all, repeatedly, that lurking is an easy, cheap way of staying out of trouble. In the end, we are punishing those who participate more, and rewarding those who lurk. This should not be the case. Being absent for some particular reason is OK. Being absent all the time and then writing rare posts that contribute little to the resolution of the game is NOT OK.

In this particular game, SPF got away with this behaviour. For a while, at least. But he has not been the only one. It is easy to feel that some of the players are conciously participating as little as decorum allows.

You are welcome. Yes to everything, and the sentence should read

>>You search the column and what appears is an average of the readings, customized for your point of view.

You can safely ignore the section labeled "THEORY".

About average and variance, the meaning depends on what they refer to. If you mean the ones in the horizontal, they are less important. Those laid in vertical are important. Which are the ones that you are referring to? Variance is, as you know, a measure of dispersion. The "Controversy" column contains the variance of the opinions expressed about a player, as a measure of how much people agree/differ about someone.

Forgot about the same D2 data, updated with current knowledge from flips. Just for comparison.

Lots of typos and mistakes. time pressure and exhaustion will do that to you. Apologies.
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@Lifthrasil: The question on JoeSapphire refers to something that has been treated extensively in posts #1012 and #1021. The other question had also been addressed. And all in posts of this very day. Seriously? Distraction or lazyness?

About the matrices, no one never said that they are a replacement for actual brainwork. They intend to be a tool for negotiation and for the analysis and following of the expressed opinions, nothing more and nothing less. They aid the generation of ideas, the use of logic and text/language/meaning analysis. Above all, they are expected to help in negotiations, whenever there is the risk of a no-lynch.

In the same vein, it can also be added that "gut feelings" are too convenient and uncompromising to be convincing, as well.

This is nice of you for those of us who cannot puzzle out large charts and graphs and such every few IRL days. Thank you. :)

(Though if THIS is meant to be the layman's chart, i'd hate to see the one for "smarterer folk" ;))

Nope, but I looked it up and will read a bit about it later...thanks for the pseudo-semi recommendation. :)

I LOVE that film....and also the second one & prequel as well....too bad they never explained more about the world that made it/other things.

----------------

I used it as it fits(imo), but yeah I could say something like highest or some other term.

I say we don't get too close to hammer on anyone until then, so they can weigh in, but I figure people can vote a bit more in the meantime.....I mean YOU YOURSELF VOTED a short while back, correct? :)
=============================================================

I'm glad I wasn't the only one. o.0


No unauthorized thestral racing on school grounds, people. ;D

(@OP: Above is NOT a vote)
===============================================================

And I was just being more silly than serious with that question(it just seemed a bit odd, you referring to the cop while talking to said cop).

No matter who we lynch we'll still be hitting from the same player pool, though.

Oh there's most likely a neutral somewhere in the player pool....as my possible results per "night" have shown(with me having 3 possible results instead of 2) there is most likely a third party hiding somewhere in the game.

Now who/what they are and how they affect town, I am not 100% sure about/on.

And I say we do like in Starship Trooper and kill em all(until we hit scum), one by one(in order of suspicion) until we hit the scum(and neutrals if need be) that is/are left. :)

But if he's town then we lose a fellow town and possibly scum get a successful NK as well...should be take that chance?
========================================================================

And what if they CONTINUE to lurk? Should we respect the IRL issues part of the game or lynch them if they "remain in the shadows" and not post much?

I say we give them some time to post reads/posts & get back into the game, and the move on from there....sound good?
=========================================================================

*Done for now....might vote tomorrow(IRL) AFTER giving the less talkative players a chance to chime in with some more posts*

Hi, sorry I've been gone a while. This should just be quick as I'm back to work tomorrow and it's already gone midnight!

He does sarcasm a lot and I panic and overthink things a lot!

No... you can cause carnage with misdirecting reads and protections.
Happy 1000th post, game!

Congrats Pooka! :D

This doesn't seem like a good tactic. And it doesn't seem like good trent.

- Early moments which peaked my interests and made me suspicious. (The infamous "we or they" post)
- The sudden and short-lived hard push against me for my not-particularly-conclusive suspicions.
- SirP and Yogsloth mostly ignored him and were against his lynchwagon Day 1.
- Interesting but not-particularly-conclusive simultaneous supposition that Trent would AND wouldn't know if there was a Night Zero.

^ Trent's recent behaviour is giving me pause for thought (why is he so certain? When people are certain about things it makes me anxious) but, I can't see Yogsloth and Trent reacting the way they did with each other as scum. I can see Pooka/SirP/Yogsloth's interactions as a team (the bits that I remember. I should find time to go and check.)

Huh. I read your post a few times and I don't understand what it is you're saying I'm doing.


These are the bits I picked out that seem to be about my behaviour:
^ Are you saying I'm focusing on a clearly town player? Who's that? Pooka?
Are you saying I'm lurking? I didn't think I was! (I know I've been missing for like 30 hours, but before I went to my friend's I was trying to give the game the attention it deserved.)

I had a look through (admittedly, a quick look - it's already way past my bedtime) Flocke's last posts to see if understandinging the above would help me understand what you're getting at in general.

Here's what I think you're referring to (based on the 'hygene' reference)

^ is that what you're refering to?

Carradice - From what I gather, you're voting for me because I mentioned that I was thinking the only person to get a scumchat to +300 posts in the time we had would be you - and you think you should be above suspicion at this stage in the game.
Is that right? I'm not trying to undermine your argument, I'm just trying to understand it, because everything you've said so far has been quite vague.

You panic a lot? So like me then? ;D

Also methinks yer sarcasm meter needs a tuneup as it is currently *Pic 1 related*

And even if that's true, I am still *pic 2 related*

Show of hands....how many play just as much/nearly as much for the IRL stuff and shooting the bull with others as playing the game? :D

I wonder.....if Trent is a third party that wins if lynched....is that even a thing in mafia games?

Bah, you clearly need to post once per 5 hours else yer scummiest of the scum. ;D

(The above bit is a joke, in case anyone else's joke meter is also broken :))
===========================================================================

(All done once again....also thanks everyone for giving me more to reply to :))

can be, it is called a Survivor.

I get that you've said that your PM gave an option for a 3rd party, but ZFR is experienced enough to not give the town the edge of knowing for sure if there are two or three parties.

To be safe, assuming and bank on the fact that we have 2 scum remaining in play.

=========================================

@Carradice: I don't mind the typos so long as I can figure out what was meant. I know I for one make my own share of typos and things that make little sense when reread.
I was looking at the horizontal row titled "Variance (Dispersion)". That is a concept I have forgotten.

Also, I'm not sure how to read the trust-o-meter chart, so despite all your hard work I shall leave it alone for now.

For confirmed scum, please leave their reads (like on me) alone so that we can more easily see who they were "clearing." That was why I asked for the long vs short sheet. Maybe it doesn't matter?

Are you still sold on Joe vs Trent / Pooka / other?
Are you the GF?

I don't see the issue with Flocke taking exception to the use of the word "hygienic" the way you seem to be; I know that jokes sometimes don't cross heart-language lines very well.... I have told too many jokes that people of other countries have told me weren't funny when translated into their heart-language (the language you think in, no matter what it is) or their humor was such that they just didn't find it amusing.

===================================
@Pooka @Carradice At this stage of the game, vote-hopping is bad, yes, but allowing another GOG D1 repetition toDay (d4) is equally bad or worse.

==========================
If we lunch the wrong guy, and the doc if any protects the wrong person etc, we lose 2 players / Day and in 4 Days have 0 confirmed-or-nearly-confirmed town. If we fail to find scum but take non-scum to lunch every day, at 10 players the game could end in 4 Days with a 1:1 tie-or even sooner if there are two scum.

==========================
@Everyone who isn't Carradice. Keep in mind that as town as I think he is, there is the possibility that he is 3rd party or even scum. I doubt it, but we won't know for sure until we find the scum. Ergo, take everything he says with a grain of salt.