Look, everyone in this game will spout their town credentials. Period. Third-person, first-person, if what you are finding scummy is people claiming town, then you are looking at the wrong things.

Its wrong in the same way as Bookwyrm's claimed plan to lure out scum. Because both sides will claim to be town. That said, if someone is giving me credit for proclaiming town, that's dumb too.

To answer your question about why Bookwyrm would be hurting town with his plan, it's simple but qualified. Assuming he is town and just baiting, then he has made it more likely we lynch a townie, because we are much more likely to lynch him. Clear now?

As to PM discussion, I disagree with both JMich and Trent, assuming people are smart about it. I pointed out, how if everyone role-claimed, town would always have an easy win. Of course, the scum would lie and make up the same roles, but by Day 2, you'd pretty much know at least one liar and town might never miss a lynch for the rest of the game. But its a boring game, basically over after a day.

People can discuss PMs responsibly and it does create useful discussion which helps town more than scum, assuming people don't slip and reveal their roles. In a normal game, the PM shouldn't even be an issue, as everyone should have the same one and its clearly posted in the OP. This game seems a bit different. It appears everyone has a slightly different one and its possible, we have all been given little clues about the enemy (or else Vitek is just completely yanking our chains).

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But let's get down to what is really important in a Day 1...
Obviously spotting slips, but one has to be careful its not just a seeming typo which does happen.
In Bookwyrm's case, where he claims he's "technically right" about how he wins if he and a townie are last alive, it just doesn't seem like such a typo or misphrasing to me. Its either intentional baiting by acting scummy, or a slip, and I explained how it has no actual value as bait. At the end of the day, its highly likely he'll end up the lynch target and it'll probably come down to him or a no-lynch. And sadly, I'm not sure we learn anything by his vote train because he did act so suspicious.

But there are other things to look for...
People pushing wagons with very weak explanations, especially those who aren't even joining the wagon...
So, like Sage, right after Krypsen claims everyone should vote for me, claims its "suspicious" I paint myself as town (ironically doing the same thing by presumably paraphrasing her PM to talk about how she "Loves this town"). If saying "I am town" is a cause for suspicion, then every player in this game (who will all claim to be town) will be equally suspicious. Its just nonsense. And nonsensical or stretched reasons for people to join a wagon is a very possible scum tell.

Other signs include derailing useful discussions. One scum might be trying to take pressure off another to change the topic before a train gets rolling.

And there is my favorite, "selectivity". Last game I was in, I correctly identified 3 of the 4 scum. We had Krypsen who seemed completely removed from the game (at least this game, he had seemed more immediately responsive in posts 108 & 110 although I now believe I may have given him too much credit). Yet, after playing obvious most of the game, when it came to going after Dedo I think it was, he went all gung ho. He had ignored everything else all game and then went after Dedo who thought is saw a town tell. Clearly scummy by being selective. Then we also had Flub who was "playing helpful" but if you watched what he was doing, he was just parroting other's observations but he seemed rather selective as well. Not pushing the wagon on certain individuals. I forget who the third was, but he had made a slip. He tried to pretend to be town, but said something which didn't match knowledge we had.

Those are the types of things I'm looking for...

Sometimes phrasing is strange, frankly a lot of the time, but the first test, would a townie say the same thing? If it passes this test I try to ignore it as white noise.

So right now, the prime scum targets are those who aren't being helpful or who are taking actions that to me seem like an attempt at subtle scum manipulation. Besides Book and Sage, another stealth candidate is JMich. His only contributions seem to be to tell us not to discuss anything because its irrelevant. I disagree, I want more people on record to help spot later inconsistencies. Furthermore, there is one word which he has used which really bothers me...in post 212...he includes the word "arsonists" in his list of possible roles. I had never heard of that role before despite playing multiple games here. It's not like Godfathers and serial killers which get mentioned as a possibility every game. For a new role like that to be mentioned on a list out of the blue, I find that a bit suspicious...

Heh.

Sorry, point taken. I should have said, "vote for RWarehall without STATED reason..."
Better?

Basically the same thing. Not exactly, I'll admit, but close enough.

He's not raving on it.

True fact. I've never seen a J.J. Abrams' film. I guess I will, though, when Star Wars VII comes out this winter.
Really, though, what do you mean?

I wouldn't put it past Vitek.
I like the rest of what RWarehall says in this post, as well. Wagon-pushing, discussion derailing, and selectivity. However, it seems pretty difficult to actually see where these are scum-tells and where they are just people playing the game poorly.

This is very interesting. I could never have picked up on that, because of inexperience, but it would be suspicious.
Can any other regulars vouch for 'arsonists' being a bit unusual?

Yes.

Nope. I'll be more precise, since that is probably where the fault lay. Sage103082 correctly guessed a significant reason for my vote on RWarehall. It may or may not have been the primary of my reasons.

...

It's 4/14 (28.57). It's made up in the sense that I don't know if there are really 4 anti-town or not, though I tend to think it's in that ballpark.

Anyway, whether it's 3/14 or 5/14 the point was that, we can be wrong for the right reasons, or right for the wrong reasons. It was basically a joking observation that if we guess right we'll pat ourselves on the back and think we're very smart in hindsight, whether or not it was ultimately just RNG falling our way this one time.

The most amusing 'unbalanced' scenario would be no mafia at all, and just several pro-town vigilantes and a few survivalists. It's highly unlikely one would have a mafia game with no mafia, but it's one potential explanation for Vitek's suggestion that 'no lynch might be a good play.' Or perhaps, and probably more likely, Vitek is recalling the last mafia game he moderated where there 3 lynches over the course of the game (based on the summary) and each time it was a townie who went down. Whoops!

I also don't really tend to believe no-lynch is a big mistake (and an anecdotal perusal of prior games doesn't seem to support that it is either), but I'm willing to play along if people are certain it's a must.

I really had no meaningful reason to vote for Sage, and yes, my post was strongly hinting I was likely just parking a vote there - I do find certain aspects of her style more suspicious than the more forward rantings of RWarehall and others. If she were scum, I think she'd be quite savvy.

It's true also, that early on my vote for Kryp was a lack of desire to hang randomly, so why not hang the guy who asked for it? Either he's crazy or suicidal, and thus not likely to help in the long run, or it's cover. Which seems to have worked since unless I missed it, despite being omnipresent, he's avoided FoS pretty much completely, hasn't he?

I don't have any idea who else is innocent, or who would be guilty, and anyone we lynch is more likely to be town than not. My curiosity in voting Kryp, frankly, as the game has gone on is that his roleplay here seems intentional and is really beyond any rational or strategic approach I can fathom.

People who have put more out there in theory are more likely to slip as the game goes. Kryp's 'kryptic' approach is unlikely to reveal anything more in Day 3 than in Day 1, no? If we're inclined to hang someone I think everyone else is really nothing more than a coin toss with odds of roughly 30% we guess right. With Kryp the odds are no different, but I'm really curious to see what method he's hiding there amidst his madness.

Finally back from 2 days worth of family quality time. Not too much going on but still some noteworthy moments.

I agree with Sage's observation that RW's wording is just a bit too LAMIST, yet her own paragraph end with "I love my town and I am going to protect it.". This is either a PM hint or her own shot at LAMIST. I don't exclude the possibility of it being the first one, but if it is I can't say I like it. I'm onboard with JMich that such discussions even backed by good intentions are more likely to result in a bad deal - scum getting more useful info rather than the rest of us.



The next thing of interest was the vote-jumping by Krypsyn. His initial vote on RW wasn't supported by reasoning at first, but I've actually experienced this first hand in a previous game, so that wasn't too surprising. The reasoning was that RW described him as more involved. I agree that "involved" in the sense of helpful rather than active isn't the first thing I would call Krypsyn and scum usually have more freedom to pay less attention and skim over the thread, which sometimes results in statements that seem correct at first, but not really if you actually are paying attention. With all that said "involved" may also mean you are taking part in some way, even if it's mostly jokes, links and cryptic actions every now and then. I still remember one game where Krypsyn was practically awol for the first few RL days where he himself stated he was more interested in playing Crusader Kings. Nevertheless, I can cope with the vote on RW. What I can't wrap my head around is the vote switch to CSPVG and jumping back to RW in the period of 5 short posts (half of which are by the game moderator). Krypsyn is dead set on RW and I can live with that, but what's with the vote swinging?



Is that for real? If yes, care to share what made you switch considering you were so afraid of accidentally hitting a townie? And to Sage?


That I don't like. I'm also not a fan of the pm discussions and unless I'm not seeing some joke here this seems like pm sharing to me. And if that is true I don't really like what it says. Even though I don't like comparing PMs I can't unsee what's already out in the open and my own piece of flavor doesn't exactly fall in line with this which makes me wonder why.



Thank you!



That I entirely agree with. I never liked reasoning in terms of "Remember how I guessed correctly X is scum 2 games ago and that other person in the previous game? I totally the authority in scum-hunting now because of my track record!". And this is even worse. Yog tends to bring some pseudo-logic to make his points so I have learned to not take his stuff too serious unless they make too much sense. And right now I'm still not convinced.



Some player views so far:

- Trent looks like usual town allied Trent. Leaning Town. Will see what will happen with his feud against Wyrm.
- bler was looking like an eager new townie until that vote swing towards Sage. A little less townie now, but still more than others, I guess. We'll see what's up.
- cristigale is bringing in good content so far, I really like her posts and her thoughts. Leaning Town.
- Sage made shared some nice thoughts initially, so I have her as leaning Town

- RW - I like some of his stuff and don't like some others. Krypsyn has him in his sights, that may or may not be relevant. Neutral for now.
- Wyrm is playing some one man army game that may or may not be harvesting the desired results. It got people moving, so that's something. Neutral for now but definitely a person of interest
- Yog seems convinced Wyrm is playing us by being too obvious which is I don't really agree with, but who knows. Even the broken clock tells the correct time twice a day. Neutral

- Krypsyn is the only person that I have never personally witnessed playing as Town and his play style is a bit hard to read so I basically have him as slightly scummy by default, but that's mostly because I still don't know better. We'll see.

For everyone else I don't have enough info to go on, I don't even want to categorize them as neutrals. JMich is the one I would like to hear more from.

It must be frustrating for you.

Bah! Methods take EFFORT!

Dangit! I just can't stay mad at you!

Let's hug it out.

Trying to steal some time during family day, lol. I'm eating more hot dogs and thinking, "wonder how the game is going?" I'll do a better write-up tonight, but just wanted to jump in here, because this "reads list" is the type of wishy-washy kack that makes me want to scream.

So, you have Krypsyn as "sightly scummy", a handful of people as "leaning Town", and the rest neutral or no data. That's great. So what's your plan, then? Sit there and go on record as having no opinion? Are you going to vote for Krypsyn, the only player you actually put on the scum side of the list? If not, why not? And I'm the broken clock?

Inquiring minds.

1) The post itself hints it's probably not real and that as long as there's no deadline on the table my sense is we're just going to see bluffs and counter-bluffs that accomplish little. It was perhaps a passive-agressive pout to lay a vote on someone I wasn't actually going to stick with. Though as noted in my last post, if Sage were guilty, I get the sense she'd be excellent at flying under the radar. However, if she's not, we probably need her.

I'm still concerned about hitting a townie, however, all the vets seem convinced that 'OMG lynch' is the summer's must-see move in Day 1. While I'm not really in line with that on a number of fronts, I'm just the newb so what do I know? I will also say I was more concerned with hitting a townie back when I thought the game was going to progress reasonably quickly. My future-guilt here in voting for anyone is assuaged by the fact that I may well be dead IRL of natural causes before we actually get to RP-hanging anybody, or not, at the end of Day 1.

2) The OP in this thread notes that this person insulted everyone in town. Being in town, I would have been insulted. That's right out there on the table. It's possible the specific language I stated having been called was PM info and I revealed something of value, or perhaps it's just narrative color I pulled out of my behind to deepen the story, as it were.

3) That's essentially the point I've been making.

Admin:
I'm fine with Leonard being gone for a week or two of real time, but if he's still gone halfway through Day 2, then I think he needs to be replaced.

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I'll take an orange juice.

Nope. Try this post.

I enjoyed VVVVVV as well, but why mention it here? o.o

That should be "stated", past tense, and I do believe my reason for doing so.

That's true, bad guys might use it too. So you need to examine the content of my posting to figure out if I'm a bad guy. Just don't forget to examine all of the people that talk about my posting, also. You not only have what I've said, you now have what half a dozen other people have said about what I've said to consider.

The biggest example (in my mind) right now is Trent's apparent lack of consideration that if the last two players are both townies, then they could win. So if I'm in the last two with a townie, and I'm a townie myself, then I could win. I'd have expected Trent to realize that. Krypsyn did, which is what I'd have expected from him.

Ask more specific questions and I'll provide more specific explanations. In the meantime, I think I've answered all of the questions that people addressed to me. If I missed one, please point it out. Sit as long as you like, regardless; I know you are barking up the wrong tree this time.

I don't think he'll be in that much trouble if I get lynched today. Too many people are giving me odd looks for him to stand out especially much.

Day 1 is pretty much all going to be based on straws and shaky theories, unless someone screws up big time. There just isn't much hard information (usually), without dipping into PMs or roles.

The obvious answer, then, is to think your way out of the circle. You can choose to (A) believe me, (B) disbelieve me, or (C) Provisionally select A or B while waiting for more information.

I'm looking to the future. Not all gains must be immediate.


What is there to comment on? "Hunh, Krypsyn hopped over then immediately hopped back" seems to go without saying, so I didn't say it. Maybe he's trying to fish for reactions. Maybe CSPVG subtly pointed something out and reminded Krypsyn of something. Maybe he's baiting yogsloth into making some kind of accusation against him (for any number of reasons). Maybe he's just amusing himself, especially since he's done this unexplained vote hopping before.

Maybe we don't have enough information to make a reasonable judgement call.

You think one townie risking his life to draw information from half of town isn't worthwhile? When I die, and with my behavior I fully expect the question is "when", I think my actions will serve my side.

I was starting to get concerned I'd see a post from you without a Youtube link. My fears have been allayed for now.

Did I claim that my plan was to lure out scum? I don't remember claiming that, but maybe I forgot with the excitement of the last few RL days.

I don't think it will come down to me or No Lynch.

I hadn't picked up on that, because I've already read about the role.

The sun was in my eyes. Lens flare is a bitch!

Fun, isn't it?

For the players that want a more serious contribution on Day 1, here you go!

Things we can be reasonably certain of:
-There is at least one town faction.
-There is at least one mafia faction.
-Each player received a PM with flavor that is probably at least somewhat unique.
-Vitek is a GoG traitor for using Steam.
-Krypsyn is screwed, because posting links from outside the forum is against the rules.
-Vitek may change the rules over the course of the game.
-Apparently some mistakes were made when sending out PMs.

Possibilities:
-Some players may have unique win conditions in addition to the standard for their side.
-There may be powers that change the number of votes required to lynch someone.
-There might be people that have more than one vote.
-There might be multiple anti-town factions, that might possibly be hostile to each other.

And now that we've about exhausted the possibilities of that, what shall we talk about next?

Final note: I'll be more serious about my voting point forward. As a last hurrah, I'll remove my vote on yogsloth when someone can identify the player that triggered my vote on him.

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Yes, up until someone tries to give me an odd drink.