Newbie 2082 - Game Over

[catboi]

Giddy up losers. I refuse to lose my sixth game out of six games. Lets bring this one home

You town this time? :3

VOTE: implosion

[catboi]

ie. “lets lim catboi for being a weeb”

Big words for a puck avatar (๑و•̀ω•́)و

That being said, your posting so far is pinging my ~gut~, so take this!

VOTE: MafMen

[catboi]

I have two smallish townreads for very silly reasons, a fast start for me in a newbie game.

[catboi]

Liking Thynhith quite a lot on this page.

[catboi]

This page is actually useful. I think igor and Aristotle are town off of it, I can see townreading Thynhith for it but I don't get as strong of vibes on him as the other two.

@MafMen: you still haven't explained exactly why you thought Greeting was townish. Do you have an explanation for why his first 3 posts townpinged you?

you like igor that much off two emoticon posts?

[catboi]

What gives you the sense he would care about he's perceived, though, given the way he's acting?

[catboi]

What gives you the sense he would care about he's perceived, though, given the way he's acting?

Nothing about him in particular does, that's the point; it's a broad statement about mafia in general. There's nothing specific about him that makes me think he'd be more or less likely than the average person to care about how he's being perceived as scum, but I think scum on average tend to care more than town, and that's probably slightly more true of newbies. It could certainly be significantly weakened (or strengthened) based on meta info.

I feel like my belief is the opposite, that newbies often don't really have a good handle on how things are perceived, such that they will tend to engage in behavior such as blatant opportunism more often.

However, igorsprite was actually my first silly townlean I spoke of on page 2. The vote on pseudoaristotle for their cheeky comment in response to his question felt good, a sort of townie kneejerk reaction from a not particular verbose player who is maybe playing a bit simply.

It occurs to me now that that assessment was maybe too simplistic, that igorsprite's posting style might be something of a deliberate gimmick, and so any town credit there for his actions might be a little premature.


I just wanted to understand why you were reading him that way to see if it made sense but felt like using it as a tangent for my own thoughts here. I don't have a good way to conclude this post so I'm just going to stop.

[catboi]

sorry idk how to express my thoughts, but basically i don't feel guilty because i'm town. is wrong to think this way?

No, that's fine, just do your best.

@Greeting what's your take on the Maf wagon? Does it look pure green?
@Cattyboi you've been on the wagon quietly all along, does that mean you approve of it?

I don't disapprove or I would've said so, think the reasons people jumped on him are valid and don't find his response to obviously townish. Fine with leaving my vote there but wouldn't really want to end the day yet, certainly not before MargotRosa posts more. ｡＾･ｪ･＾｡

[catboi]

I agree with what Thynhith said up there! I'm unsure of a lot of the same people and most suspicious of Igor and Mafmen. I think based on Igor's quick vote they likely aren't

both

scum, but either is possible? Again, don't really agree with the reasoning Mafmen brought up that Igor's just too obvious to be maf, since so many of us are inexperienced in here. Placing a vote here for now.

VOTE: igorsprite

Missing here is any reason igorsprite is actually scum

[catboi]

I see the game exploded while I was away, not typical for weekend activity. I can't find the energy to properly catch up right now, apologies.

[catboi]

I think the townreads being expressed on frogsfrogs are very, very premature.

I like implosion's 131 quite a bit, first two thoughts are similar to my own, points on Thynhith aren't bad at a glance, did not like thyn's vote on igor when I looked at it.

Don't really agree with Greeting's 141, can easily see scum making those sorts of posts. Think Greeting's townread on me was a bit too early for what I've actually done this game, but meh

[catboi]

You know what? Normally, I don’t do this but this time I think it’s worth it.

Put me at E-1 and I’ll hammer myself. On the condition that you vote out Val89 the next day.

The offer’s on the table. Of course that means we’ll lose one townie, but the beauty of being a VT (yes, this is a claim) is that my sacrifice wouldn’t necessarily be bad for town. And if it takes down a scum then I think it’s worth it.

I don't remember you reacting this explosively to getting tunneled in our last game. What's up?

[catboi]

I kind of like MafMen on page 7. No concrete way of explaining it, just do. Feels real enough.

[catboi]

Val's tunnel and points against greeting regarding setup nonsense are mostly lousy and don't really make any good reason for Greetign being actually scum. I grow tired of reading them.

[catboi]

My take on the situation is that Maf, psuedo and igfor are in a dark little triangle of their own, and I have difficulty seeing through. At this stage I'd be most comfortable limming out of those 3. Plus their newbieness muddies everything up.
And implosion seems a little too distant for my liking. Hope we hurry up with Margot coming back or her replacement.

I'm going to sheep implosion on this, this is a very scummy post. I have no other strong scumreads right now, nya. (一。一;;）

VOTE: Thynhith

[catboi]

Where'd everyone go (T_T)

[catboi]

I don't think there is much room for ambiguity on this one - either you are with MafMen and Greeting, and think it's perfectly fine to speculate on the setup and pseudoclaim VT, as long as it can be handwaved way as possibly being a bit of WIFOM, or you understand why it isn't.

Disingenuous framing, bad look for you. People can do things that are not necessarily good play while still being town-aligned. This is a fairly basic lesson most people figure out very quickly.

I would have thought since you played in 2073, and you probably remember the eventual alignment of the slot that started that business (although, I do understand if you would also prefer to forget that game ever took place!) you would understand why I have taken an issue with it here.

You bringing up that game is predictable and rote, and does not sway my view whatsoever. I do not believe what Greeting said was done with the intention of getting anyone to out their roles.

As it happpens, Greeting has now explicitly claimed VT.

@Catboi: Do you think a) that's a good play, and b) it's alignment-indicative in any way, and why?

Without intent to hammer, probably not a good play, but probably >rand town as frustrated early VT claims tend to go (although also not as meaningful with a tracker claimed in the open)

[catboi]

That's funny, because I've been labouring all this time under the impression you've spent pages arguing that what Greeting has been doing is perfectly acceptable, and that I'm running some sort of gross and disingenuous mafia scam for taking issue with it.

You're making the leap from framing an action as "unacceptable" to somehow insisting this action is likely to be coming from a member of the mafia. There's an obvious lack of logical connection here and the fact that you're still hung up on that point and seemingly unable to acknowledge this is either a sign of unearthly stubbornness (not out of the question) or just willful bad faith

[catboi]

I know this is activity-based meta, but I see frogsfrogs online most of the time I'm around and they have almost three times less posts than I do. They aren't posting in any other games. What's up with that? In 221, Val89 strongly townread frogs, without really saying why.

Maybe I'm being paranoid about this, but I think it should be pointed out.

Well, if we are going to open that door; I've noticed that both you and MafMen are routinely hiding your online status.

Given that it appears activity-based meta is something you think worth pointing out, are you hoping to hide something that way?

This, also, is just a fairly poor reaction from val here - the immediate "oh yeah well what about YOU" attempted reversal on Greeting looks like like if anything he's flustered at Greeting making such a read - you might find it distasteful but I rarely see scum make these sort of online status based reads that Greeting did here (additionally, breaking free of the argument to try to rope in frogsfrogs is something I rarely see scum do in this situation although that's a weaker read). I struggle to see the response here as coming from a town mindset.

[catboi]

Problem is, I'm not entirely sure what MafMens' stance actually

is

at present.

A claimed tracker at this stage is far from ideal, but if you are town, and right not I think that's such a huge ask for me to beleive, you running around basically rolecoping yourself for scum, and throwing around such wild and anti-town plays with every other breath isn't helping very much, is it?

Every post from Val is just this. Absurdly disingenuous. The strongest argument he can make is that such plays aren't "helping very much". The operative word here is "helping". As though town are always "helpful". As though scum don't have strong incentive to appear "helpful", as though such a thing is a significant risk for scum. As if trying to sort people along a helpful/unhelpful axis will lead to any sort of result at all. But this is the whole of what val's reasoning has been and he never explains why that makes someone scum.

He's a bloviator so I think people just get blown away by the volume of words to ignore how thin and repetitive the actual reasoning is.

[catboi]

Anyway, significant chance Val and Thyn were just distancing from each other but Thyn has very likely flaked (he's past the prod timer already). If he were here I'd have preferred some sort of consolidation/intent to hammer.

[catboi]

Without intent to hammer, probably not a good play, but probably >rand town as frustrated early VT claims tend to go (although also not as meaningful with a tracker claimed in the open)

Pardon? Why is is

less

meaningful with a tracker claim already?

VT claim less meaningful with a tracker claim because one PR is outed, obviously, less claim space for mafia to hide in. Still lean that the

way

Greeting did it is probably more town-leaning than not although he's not in the top of my reads.

[catboi]

Looks like Thynhith said he was going to have decreased activity but isn't familiar enough with the forum to declare V/LA. Unfortunate.

[catboi]

To be blunt, if Thynhith is scum I think it clears implosion and MafMen (but of when are in the individually pretty town but not full trust category ATM), and I think pseudoaristotle has been towny despite an overall lack of content. That leaves not much room.

Val made some comments throwing shade at Thyn for reasons that I think I far more substantial than anything he's thrown at Greeting, but continues his tunnel toward Greeting while only slapping Thyn with a scumlean and not much else. Thyn comes in with a "I would advise everyone to look at Val/Greeting more carefully" and an fos on Val but is mainly content to point to a past game and let other people do the legwork, he also avoids actually moving his vote here.


It's possible of course that I'm just misreading Greeting in this but I think he comes off significantly better in this argument but if Thyn is scum it doesn't really matter, they can both fit snugly in the POE.

[catboi]

Val made some comments throwing shade at Thyn for reasons that I think I far more substantial than anything he's thrown at Greeting, but continues his tunnel toward Greeting while only slapping Thyn with a scumlean and not much else. Thyn comes in with a "I would advise everyone to look at Val/Greeting more carefully" and an fos on Val but is mainly content to point to a past game and let other people do the legwork, he also avoids actually moving his vote here.

That's not very fair to say, is it? Did you miss the

bolded

notice for reduced activity? I will look into the past game again, but I had no time to do it when I made the post. It was as much a reminder for myself as for town. And I'm against voting out Val, at least D1, because his align will be much more obvious in later days.
In fact it seems you're avoiding voting Val, despite declaring him to be disingenuous, thin and repetitive. Why go after someone on v/la over only a couple posts? VOTE: catboi

You are both at the bottom of my reads individually. A wagon on you is viable, one on val is not, but if you flipped red he'd be one of the people I'd consider. I was mostly musing out in the open about potential teammates to make my thinking clear. I generally try to discourage preflip associations on day 1 in newbie games, but my townreads this game are decent enough that I have to start thinking in that manner. And I don't think it was just "a couple posts" that made me want to go after you, it was agreeing with the points implosion had made about you.

[catboi]

i have half a mind to townlean them just because i mindmeld with a lot of what they have said
its a bit bizarre for me of all people to be commenting on this but their reasoning for being on my wagon feels about as dull as igor, except ones an SE and ones a newb PR but given that i was, and probably still am widely scumread i dont blame them that much for it, but its atleast enough for me to take back the "my wagon looks pure" comment

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ My initial vote on you was barely for a reason at all, my gut feel was that your early game was a bit too conversational, a bit too many posts just replying to things without the type of comment that moves the game forward. Then you outed a townread that didn't look believable and you got voted for it and I was okay with it. Have been wrong before on that sort of thing but at the time, it was the best I had to go on with what had been posted. I lean significantly more toward you being genuine now although I couldn't point to anything specific to justify that. I do think your complete nonchalance about the wagon would be bold play as scum in a newbie game.

[catboi]

Only... Maf isn't a newbie, and that sort of play would work even better in a newbie game

Not really? Newbies are significantly more likely to be sticky with their votes in my experience, not addressing it at all or even really trying to push a counter means someone is

generally

more likely to get tunneled

And if I flipped green, what would you get from it?

"if" you flip green?

[catboi]

And if I flipped green, what would you get from it?

"if" you flip green?

Mate, no need to be a smartass eh? If I flip green, as in if I get limmed this day and flip green, what do you get from it?

I always feel it's worth interrogating that sort of language, because I don't know why you'd feel compelled to put "if" there instead of "when". Regardless, what that would tell me at any rate is that I need to re-assess, and frogsfrogs likely falls considerably in my estimation if you're town.

[catboi]

What makes you say a wagon on me wouldn't be viable?

Because as it is the only one who expressed any sort of interest in voting you is Greeting whereas most others think you're town, not really hard to read the room. No sense kicking and screaming about a read on day 1.

Have you given us those more-decent-then-usual townreads, yet?

Dunno if it wasn't clear, I feel reasonably okayish about implo (who was my second early gut townread) and MafMen, pseudoaristotle is probtown, I think Greeting is towny although that one is the shakiest.

Leaves not much room!

[catboi]

I'l be honest I threw out the D1 herosolve, even though I'm generally against those things in principle, because I wanted to see the response it'd get. Not sure if Val is just sick of me dissing his posts but I feel like he got a bit evasive in response, those two questions I just answered were pretty perfunctory.

Thyn's response gives me a little more doubt, anyway, even with his odd wording choice, but the defensiveness over voting Val in 325 feels rather notable. Not sure why he'd assume Val would "become more readable" on later days, and that doesn't really jibe with his earlier insistence that the Val/Greeting interaction was "potentially telling" in 216/321 - it doesn't make a great deal of sense for Thyn to be pointing the finger there and telling people to look at it, but then balk at the idea of acually trying to look into Val on day 1 - does he or does he not think Val is someone who should be looked into?

[catboi]

Because as it is the only one who expressed any sort of interest in voting you is Greeting whereas most others think you're town, not really hard to read the room.

Except that isn't true, is it? That's why I asked the question in the first place. MafMen

has

voted me today, and although he has unvoted he was pretty explicit that wasn't because he started townreading me. In fact, as far as I recall, the only slots that have said they are townreading me are Implosion and Frogsfrogs. That leaves 6 slots who either have explicitly shaded me, or said they are on the fence, or not mentioned me at all. You only need 5 for a lim.

It's pretty suspect, and it makes me wonder if you actually beleive what you are saying. I think you know the people who haven't come out with a read on me yet may indeed end up townreading me, because you know I am town, and acting as such.

That...makes no sense. If as scum I believe someone is too townread to be a vialable elim, I concede the townread and move on (also, how would I possibly know that someone who isn't me is going to be townreading you in the future?). My motives here are...what, exactly?

I'l be honest I threw out the D1 herosolve, even though I'm generally against those things in principle

I generally try to discourage preflip associations on day 1 in newbie games

Why do you ordinarary discourage this?

Because in general pre-flip associatives are bad, too easy to get caught up in theorizing a team based on entirely incidental interactions, you're much less likely to be right on an exact team than on a single scumread. In general in newbie games it's best to discourage that sort of thinking, but I can't help my brain from working in those terms especially when the game is small-ish and I'm starting to POE things down, I find a suspect and work out who they could plausibly be teamed with. Has worked out okay for me in the past. But it's still mosy important to focus on whether someone, on an individual level, is playing like scum.

[catboi]

While we are on the subject of Thynhith, I have a bit of additional context for that slot.

People have correctly deduced there was a bit of background tension between Thyn and the previous occupant of my slot. I was also in that game they played together, and won as scum.

Post 50 is interesting, because the justification that was given, that another slot had given a TMI read on the basis of exactly 3 posts, was precisely the same fake-justification, albeit more verbosely, I gave for scumreading his Mason partner. You may want to have a look at the exchange I had (link) on the issue, and in fact, Thyn's approach to that game more widely, because I am getting a very different vibe to his play this time around. That also applies to the "be careful not to hammer yet unless you mean to" concern at 82, another post Greeting describes as "very towny", which again, was an interaction scum!me had with Thyns slot in that game.

Thyn couldn't predict, of course, that I would end up replacing into this game, and it seems faily plausable to me that, having just lost a game to scum, he may well attempt to replicate that scum game he had seen work so well when he rolled scum himself. My read on greeting is stronger presently, but these are all reason I'm not townreading Thyn on the basis of those posts. In fact, given the vibe is markedly different to that last town!Thyn game, I am scumleaning that slot.

And I'm against voting out Val, at least D1, because his align will be much more obvious in later days.
In fact it seems you're avoiding voting Val, despite declaring him to be disingenuous, thin and repetitive.

Thyn, what has made you decide that catboi is avoiding voting me for different reasons that you have elected to do so yourself?

I mean, look at the read Val outed on Thyn earlier in the game, and then look at this incredibly weak engagement with Thyn on his return to the game, at a time when Thyn is getting pressured by several players. Does it look like Val is trying to actually solve Thyn here?

[catboi]

Okay, but I just told you my townreads, so do you really think I'm "keeping my options open" there? I've ruled myself out of multiple votes That's not at all akin to what Thynhith was doing and it's not really hard to tell them apart.

Every response you give is just convincing me further that I'm right and the game's already wrapped up, all over but the shouting.

[catboi]

I'm fine with this ┐( ˘_˘)┌

If town, would advise looking into frogs for their vote here

If scum, remember what I said about Val (don't think a townflip is great for Val but a scumflip is really bad)

[catboi]

And that's why you don't mess around with pre-flip associatives. Sorry.

Well, regardless, I had a thought crop into my head overnight, want to check back and see if my hunch was on to something.

[catboi]

Hm, the thought was that mafmen was getting himself entangled in an argument with Val for the sake of arguing against someone he knew was using faulty reasoning and get wrapped up in that rather than making real contributions. I don't know how much I want to commit to that view right now but certainly don't townlean there on review.

[catboi]

VOTE: frogsfrogs

Starting here. Think their day 1 amounted mostly to opportunistic sheeping, little in the way of their own thoughts, the things people have given them towncred for are laughably shallow.

[catboi]

One last things:

@igorsprite:

if you got a report, you should say so

but should not out the contents of the report

. the mafia already know whether or not there is a roleblocker/jailkeeper in the setup, so outing this info can only benefit town.

[catboi]

jesus christ

[catboi]

Whatever, not going to dwell on it.

Strange, do you have actual reads?

[catboi]

I'm open to frogs, catboi and potentially StrangeMatter today. Still not interested in val or greeting, MafMen I can be convinced on but it would take a fair amount. I agree with catboi that frogs is one of the least townish people here but I also think if frogs is town then it's entirely possible catboi is scum who sees a townie that they think they can maneuver back into the lim pool; I'm decently confident there'd be scum in the two of them anyway just because of PoE.

I admit frogs is probably a player I'd be pushing here as scum. But I'm town this game and I should b able to prove that eventually.

No one died. This means: we have a Doctor who saved the nightkill or we have a Jailkeeper who targeted either the nightkill or someone who might have tried to kill.

Or...

someone

is lying.

I honestly don’t understand why no one is discussing this. What a weird game.

Probably because there's nothing actually interesting to be gleaned from discussing it at this time. I have theories as to what happened. I don't believe outing them now will help.

[catboi]

VOTE: frogsfrogs

Starting here. Think their day 1 amounted mostly to opportunistic sheeping, little in the way of their own thoughts, the things people have given them towncred for are laughably shallow.

I'd disagree that I gave very few of my thoughts. I was definitely vote shy for part of the day in a way people super aren't here, but I think I've been clear about myself and my reads. What do you think was less "oppertunistic sheeping" about your #3 Thynhith vote as opposed to mine??

Are you asking me why I believe

my own vote

wasn't scummy?

Yes, I sheeped implo's case because it made sense to me. That does not matter in terms of me perceiving your actions as not being town motivated.

[catboi]

Igorsprite left off of the list as he's a PR claim. I do want him to say what he thinks he got out of that short lie but I think it's scummy if you're full on pushing him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

i was waiting catboi's reaction but he didn't say anything, i think that means that it's good for him if i didn't act, coincidentally he acted last night.

@catboi do you have anything to say?

LMAO, no, I didn't act last night. Funny enough, I was suspicious of the claim of no action. Looks like I was right.

VOTE: igorsprite

[catboi]

For the record, since I am now pushed to hardclaiming VT: my working theory is that the scumteam is highly inexperienced, because it is blatantly obvious who is a PR and I would have killed them last night. It's quite likely that we're in column C, and igor got lucky by claiming tracker in the setup with a jailkeeper.

[catboi]

Also, igorsprite, if this is some manner of contrived reaction test, you absolutely need to retract immediately, because it is a terrible play and totally unacceptable. I've already had one newbie game ruined by someone gamethrowing with a fakeclaim as town, I do not want that to happen again.

[catboi]

The vote on igorsprite from frogs in the early game certainly complicates things in my view, but it's hard for me to spot a potential partner. I wouldn't necessarily rule out that being a panicky bus. I think Greeting is clear because he wouldn't try to lead a vote on his partner, and igorsprite pushed back on him later in the day. The wagon hop on MafMen from igorsprite means they are unlikely to be partners, and I think the interactions between pseudoaristotle and igor are never scum/scum. realistically in my view it only leaves frogs and implosion as potential teammates for igorsprite.

[catboi]

For the record, since I am now pushed to hardclaiming VT: my working theory is that the scumteam is highly inexperienced, because it is blatantly obvious who is a PR and I would have killed them last night. It's quite likely that we're in column C, and igor got lucky by claiming tracker in the setup with a jailkeeper.

how do you know that the other PR is a jailkeeper? i said that was a doctor and my action worked

VOTE: catboi

Okay, then you're hardclaiming, good to know.

Bear in mind, if you are faking this as town, you are gamethrowing and will be singlehandedly responsible for a town loss. I highly advise not continuing with this if that is the case. It is my hope that you are simply scum faking a guilty report as a desperate play, but I can't really rule anything out with a new player who has acted strangely. Faking guilties as town is never, ever a good thing to do.

FTR, I think it's highly likely it was a jailkeeper who blocked igorsprite and can counter claim here, don't put anyone in hammer range until that happens. In the event there isn't a direct counter to igorsprite, it is technically the mechanically "safe" play to vote me here, although I feel like it should be entirely self-evident I am town, I don't necessarily blame anyone for going down that route.

[catboi]

I entirely hate the direction of where this game is. I don't disagree with the idea of Eliminate All Liars, but I feel like it's the type of mantra (according to the wiki at least) that gets easily abused by scum. Also, I feel like this isn't abnormal that as scum, catboi could be completely lying about not doing anything as well to cover for themselves.

I mean, yes, that's the nature of the game, you have to decide if someone is telling the truth or not.

But for the record, I almost never put myself in a direct CC with the tracker here as scum - if it's in column B, with the doctor, CCing the tracker just makes me confirmed scum and I lose every time. If it's in column A, I'd have roleblocked the tracker every time, and there is no way the tracker would both be alive and have a report. It just doesn't go down this way if I'm scum, period.

[catboi]

What the hell is going on here? Why did Greeting and catboi align so quickly after catboi claimed VT, as if that couldn't be false?? Igor, what is it you're saying about your track results? Did you see catboi visit someone or not???

i didn't see lol, the jailkeeper targeted me last night so i received no result

Great, thanks, you've forced me to out for absolutely no good reason with your completely boneheaded play.

UNVOTE:

[catboi]

catbois reaction was pretty gross though yeah
despite the weird townplay igor has remained uncced this entire game, the immediate jump when you get tested is whack
VOTE: catboi

No, it's not. What other reaction am I supposed to have to someone faking a guilty report on me? This is idiotic.

[catboi]

@implosion idk, i said that to instigate catboi because i think that he is scum and his reaction now just confirms that for me. btw we have a jailkeeper that targeted me, not a doctor, idk how catboi knew that because i said that a doctor targeted me

@catboi wtf, bad idea. why do you want the jailkeeper to CC me instead of the "true" tracker? for me you just want to know who is the jailkeeper because you already know that i'm the tracker

I said that because

I knew you were lying

. Not hard to string this together.

[catboi]

From a town's perspective, if someone is claiming a tracker result on them when they are VT, what is the more likely possibility: that the fae claime is lying scum, or that the seemingly noob player is faking a result as a test? (;¬_ლ)

Further, how the hell am I supposed to react? As scum I'd

know

it was a bluff, and not be worried at all. As town, I have to consider the possibility that igorsprite is simply claiming as a way to get me eliminated.


igorsprite, how much experience do you have playing mafia?

[catboi]

Because, were it setup A2, I would have the roleblocker on the tracker, and the goon would kill either the tracker or [secret PR read]. I would know, no matter what, that the tracker could not have a legitimate report on me. Therefore I would have basically no cause for concern whatsoever.

[catboi]

igorsprite, how much experience do you have playing mafia?

i played 5 or 6 games i guess

5 or 6 games, where? Where did you get the idea for these reaction test shenanigans you just pulled?

[catboi]

igorsprite, how much experience do you have playing mafia?

i played 5 or 6 games i guess

5 or 6 games, where? Where did you get the idea for these reaction test shenanigans you just pulled?

osu. about the idea idk, it's something that i like to do when i'm confirmed town, and my playstyle is pretty anti-town

What does "osu" refer to?

I ask because there is significant dissonance between your day 1 act of "i'm a noob, idk what i'm doing" and you pulling this test today, as that's a more advanced play than i'd expect from a newbie, which makes me think you're faking being a noob to gain an advantage ingame, which would be very suspicious. You're decidedly not clear, which is why I'm bothering to pursue this line of questioning at all.

[catboi]

Okay. I'll pack away my tinfoil for now and take what you say at face value. I'm still extremely annoyed at how this has all unfolded but just have to move on at this point. I should probably just step away from the game for tonight since I'm too tilted to respond properly. (⁎˃ᆺ˂)

[catboi]

@implosion idk, i said that to instigate catboi because i think that he is scum and his reaction now just confirms that for me.

So, mind telling me why you thought I was scum in the first place?

[catboi]

@catboi, what's your opinion of Greeting's slot right now?

Mmm, there's some concern that he's just hard buddying me and the townread on me came too easily but I still lean on him being more likely genuine here.

I have some thoughts on the team but want an answer from igorsprite first.

[catboi]

I should be selfevidently town because I wouldn't have reacted to the tracker guilty that way at all (because I'd either know it's fake or because it'd confirm me), and because the other PR is really, really obvious and I'd have just nightkilled them.

[catboi]

With all this said: I think catboi is the best lim for today, for a variety of reasons. They're in my PoE and they've already claimed VT now, for one, even if it was for bad reasons. They said yesterday that they'd be able to prove that they're town eventually but ostensibly each aspect of their play so far (joining me on thynhith, the way they've pushed frogs, the way they've reacted to igor, the way they were talking about val yesterday) has a lot of utility as scum and just like, idk. It just feels like they're doing things they'd do as scum, more or less. They said this about frogs. Everything they've done has a perfectly reasonable justification for them to have done as town but taken as a whole there's just nothing that I wouldn't expect them to have done as scum. They said that they should be "self-evidently" town when they thought they were in a CC with igor and I just don't see why they think they would be self-evidently town there as town when they recently said they haven't really proven it yet.

Seriously, this is ass. Do better.

[catboi]

We're 20 pages into the game and on day 2 and the best you have on me is "IDK, hasn't done anything town". Maybe because you haven't put any effort into trying to sort me even once. Are you even trying to scumhunt?

[catboi]

Why isn't this exactly how you'd react as scum to a tracker guilty that you know is fake?

How does "I'd have just nightkilled the other PR" imply you're town when no one died last night?

...Because I'D KNOW HE WAS BLUFFING?

And because I'd have nightkilled the other PR, rather than having a kill blocked???

[catboi]

That's a drastic misrepresentation of what I said and you know it.

That's an exact representation of the lazy-ass reasoning behind your vote. It doesn't purport any actual reasoning to why what I'm doing is scum motivated just bullshit shrug POE reasons while taking advantage of the momentum against me because of igorsprite's horseshit claim. You're not really investigating my posts, you're not questioning me at all, you're not trying to solve me

[catboi]

So I ask you: are you scum, or are you just playing like shit?

[catboi]

Why isn't this exactly how you'd react as scum to a tracker guilty that you know is fake?

How does "I'd have just nightkilled the other PR" imply you're town when no one died last night?

...Because I'D KNOW HE WAS BLUFFING?

And because I'd have nightkilled the other PR, rather than having a kill blocked???

I genuinely don't know what you're getting at here. What would have been different about your reaction given that you'd know he was bluffing (which I've made clear I understand)?

If the other PR is a jailkeeper (if we're in 2a) why can't it be the case that you tried to do this but the kill was blocked by the jailkeeper blocking whichever scum committed the kill?

Because I don't put myself into a fight with the tracker and flip out (which, always, always makes people conf-bias the shit out of the reaction) when it's clear their result isn't real? I'd just go "I ddidn't go anywhere, retract", etc. Being informed means there's no pressure from a test result and I think it's very clear I actually felt pressured there.

If the jailkeeper blocked the kill they'd have a soft guilty. Which also

clearly

hasn't happened. (actually, I probably roleblock the PR read and shoot igorsprite in that world, thinking of it, but regardless, the other PR is extremely obvious and it's clear mafia failed to take advantage of this)

[catboi]

you're not questioning me at all,

I mean, apart from the fact that I am literally doing that right now...

That's an exact representation of the lazy-ass reasoning behind your vote. It doesn't purport any actual reasoning to why what I'm doing is scum motivated just bullshit shrug POE reasons while taking advantage of the momentum against me because of igorsprite's horseshit claim. You're not really investigating my posts, you're not questioning me at all, you're not trying to solve me

But to answer the whole of this post: you giving a broad "your reasoning is shit" doesn't dissuade me, astonishingly.

I think you've had plenty of time to show that you're town. Lots of people have had that time, and lots of them, in my view (val, and mafmen, and igor, and to a lesser extent Greeting and to a lesser extent but still more than you IMO frogs and psueodaristotle) have done this. When the entire rest of the player list has done this and I've looked at your posts and found a whole lot of things that, sure, could make sense as town, but also completely make sense as scum, well, i mean.

VOTE: implosion

Cool, you're just scum bullshitting then. Die.

[catboi]

"derp i'm questioning you" while asking loaded questions that you clearly don't have any real care about what I answer, because you're not trying to sort me, because you just want to elim me for lazy tossed-off reasoning.

[catboi]

FWIW, I looked at igorsprite's games offsite, and I think there's a fair chance still he's fakeclaiming here - as scum, he leaned heavily into the noob "idk what i'm doing, help me out guys" act he's doing here, and also faked a dumbtell to win a game as mafia. I get a similar sense of that here. The only thing I hesitate at is that him egging on the votes and claiming early day 1 feels relatively townish. But as town he seems to be a bit more bluntly assertive with his opinions rather than aimlessly following the crowd.

I know people are huge cowards when it comes to voting out an Un-CC'ed PR claim, but it's worth keeping in mind down the line, because I don't really trust him at all with the way he's been playing. I was hoping to wait for him to respond before I talked about this, but implo's shitpush on me has me feeling like I need to get this out in the open ASAP.

[catboi]

For reference, this is the igorsprite scum game in question, with a link to the post where he fakes a dumbtell about not knowing how many mafia are in the game: https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/top ... 0750?n=186

The setup was NewD3, which is of course the same as this one. That's notable to me because he made this post in this game:

we have 2 scums, right?

Which could have been an attempt to replicate the cred he got for that game.

Other games I referenced:

scum:
https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/topics/1387366?n=1
https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/topics/1414162?n=1 (subbed out after day 1)

town:
https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/topics/1358016?n=1
https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/topics/1366830?n=1


I wouldn't say it's a definite thing because in general he seems low-content regardless of alignment, but he's also keenly aware of how he's perceived and I can't help but think the "im a noob idk what to do please help me uwu" act may be manufactured to garner sympathy.

[catboi]

Die.

lotta bravado while you're sitting vanity voting at e-2.

I don't care, I'm flipping town, and you should absolutely be the next elimination when I do.

[catboi]

I

believe

MafMen legitimately thinks my reaction was bad. I don't believe your read on me is genuine whatsoever or that you are approaching me in remotely good faith right now.

[catboi]

Why isn't this exactly how you'd react as scum to a tracker guilty that you know is fake?

How does "I'd have just nightkilled the other PR" imply you're town when no one died last night?

...Because I'D KNOW HE WAS BLUFFING?

And because I'd have nightkilled the other PR, rather than having a kill blocked???

We aren't in your head, we need another layer of explanation. What are you saying would have been different / better about your reaction if you were hypothetically scum and Igor claims to have seen you visit?

Edit after seeing new posts pop up: Sorry yes, exactly what Implosion said. We just don't know what your full argument is. Also, I think trying to reverse card onto implosion for "not having scum hunted at all' is a rough sell for making yourself look townie D: Maybe you don't consider this pushes to be correct but they haven't

not

existed??

It's not about not existing, it's about whether implosion is actually trying to figure out whether people are town or scum, or just making up things to attack. The fact that he considers me to be an acceptable elimination based on weaksauce reasoning indicates he's just looking to flip me and is not actually trying to find mafia, because at a minimum I'd expect some deeper level of inquiry/reasoning here, and instead he's coasting on too-confident townreads and shallow POE. It's not genuine. There's no attempt to sort people.

[catboi]

Lol, okay.

[catboi]

I want a promise from everyone that after you flip me, implosion gets insta-voted tomorrow.

[catboi]

There is no way town is this far up their own ass, when called on his shallow reasoning he gets smug and dismissive, he knows he has the upper hand here, whatever. There's no way any of this treatment of me is remotely good faith and he is straining in the most tenuous way to shut down my objections rather than considering that this could be coming from town perspective.

WHEN I FLIP TOWN, YOU VOTE IMPLOSION 100%

[catboi]

he's coasting on too-confident townreads and shallow POE

You're saying this to call me scum, but this is actually a way to describe my town playstyle that is a remarkable combination of accurate and uncharitable. Falling into too-confident townreads that I fail to get myself out of is something that happens and that I sometimes shoot myself in the foot with, but I also ride those townreads to victory sometimes (I'd like to think more often than random but like, I'm not especially good at online mafia lol)

Not going to get into the self-deprecation (I know you were pretty good, although that was a long time ago) but am I supposed to believe you're not just imitating that here? That you're content to rest on evaluation you made midway into day 1? Nah, nah, nahhh.

[catboi]

i really do hope you're i'm right that you're not town if you're acting like this means anything in a newbie game. I'm not being smug or dismissive. I mean I guess I'm being dismissive in the sense that i am literally dismissing you're arguments because I disagree with them. I'm just not being persuaded.

I mean, of course you're not being persuaded, because you're scum and don't actually care about my alignment. THAT'S MY ENTIRE POINT.

[catboi]

could make a snide comment about the proofreading fail on that post being scum-indicative, but that's over the top and i don't actually believe that

[catboi]

Like, your first reaction to me indicating suspicion on you was to say "this is ass, do better" without offering any kind of alternative or any actual reasoning, when all game you've been saying you've found me generally reasonable and have indicated no suspicion of me whatsoever.

And when I indicate suspicion on you you more or less immediately jump at my throat after like three posts of calling my reasoning ass and seemingly expecting me, if town, to magically change my mind.

Like, wtf? How am I supposed to work with you if we're both town there?

Because while all game I've found you reasonable, your approach to me is anything but, your reasoning for voting me is

absolutely terrible

and

incredibly shallow

, and comes after having done basically ~no interaction with me or investigation of my posts, and I don't believe it comes in remotely good faith. I'd expect if there was

some

intention of solving me there would be more reasoning behind it, and you have none. Your whole push on me is too terrible to believe it comes from town.


How am I supposed to "work with you" when you come at me with absolutely terrible reasoning and shut down every explanation I have? You're trying to act like I'm being unreasonable here but you're the one who's determined to eliminate me regardless of anything I say.

[catboi]

You act as though "reasonable sum" isn't, like, an entirely common archetype. That, okay, I didn't suspect you until you started voting me and I OMGUSed (yes, I admit it!) But the thing is I can try to work out whether people's votes on me make sense or not, and I do not believe you vote and push me this way as town. That my read on you is entirely reactive doesn't make it

less valid

. Sometimes it's just not apparent who scum are until they're trying to kill you.

[catboi]

Actually, I'll just outright say it: implosion should know better than to scumread me here. Screw the self-deprecation.

He asks "how am I supposed to work with you", but his read on me

gives me nothing to work with

. The goal here is to paint me as unreasonable when in fact he is the one not trying to reason with me and is only concerned with flipping me. There was never any attempt to work with me on his part.

[catboi]

@implosion idk, i said that to instigate catboi because i think that he is scum and his reaction now just confirms that for me.

So, mind telling me why you thought I was scum in the first place?

I already said, it's the feeling u.u

That doesn't explain anything.

[catboi]

What "feeling"? Give me some sort of words here, or even literally quote a post you found suspect.

[catboi]

theres a 0.0000000000000000000000000000001% chance igors tracker claim is fake, meta doesnt matter when hes been uncc'd for like a week

Setup Information

NewD3 (as designed by RadiantCowbells):

	A	B	C
Mafia	Mafia Roleblocker	Mafia Rolecop	Mafia Goon
Row 1	Town Cop and Town Doctor	Town Tracker and Town Friendly Neighbor	Town Cop and Vanilla Townie
Row 2	Town Jailkeeper and Town Tracker	Town Jailkeeper and Town Friendly Neighbor	Town Jailkeeper and Vanilla Townie
Row 3	Town Mason and Town Mason	Town Tracker and Town Doctor	Town Mason and Town Mason

Refer to the third column, setup C2: It's entirely possible that igor is a mafia goon fakeclaiming who got lucky that the setup is the one where a tracker is not directly CC'd by another power role. Him doing the "vote me I want to see who hops on routine" seemed maybe kind of town but I find the way he's acted to be incredibly suspicious.

I encountered almost this exact scenario in a prior newbie game and had to metaphorically scream my head off just to get it through to people that it was possible the tracker was fakeclaiming. People are so, so quick to accept any PR claim and it's incredibly hard for them to even consider the possibility of one being fake.

[catboi]

For reference, this is the igorsprite scum game in question, with a link to the post where he fakes a dumbtell about not knowing how many mafia are in the game: https://osu.ppy.sh/community/forums/top ... 0750?n=186

The setup was NewD3, which is of course the same as this one. That's notable to me because he made this post in this game:

we have 2 scums, right?

Which could have been an attempt to replicate the cred he got for that game.

Hey that was not fake, i really didn't know how many scums were >:(

That was my first game and the first time that the mod modded a game and he forgot to say who was my scum partner, and i thought that i needed to find my scum partners by myself xD

Wait you didn't have any sort of private chat?

[catboi]

ive never ever liked when people say "when i die go after (x) person next" as that's just a bunch of disingenuous nonsense that could easily be used to manipulate town into shifting the wagon off of them and onto the accuser
instead of defending yourself youre going on the offensive against implosion, as if rather than arguing the scumread against you, youre trying to appeal to the town instead and i wouldnt say that bodes well for your alignment

Doing what I'm doing almost never actually shakes off pressure in my experience. Mafia players are inherently selfish egotists: everyone wants to be the hero with the right reads who solves the game, so no one cares about the reads of dead townies. I'm no different, of course, I just want to actually feel listened to at all rather than someone who gets strung up and then ignored, as has happened countless times in mafia games. I just want the assurance that implosion dies, you don't even have to trust me here and now.

You may find my response to be

unpleasant

and

off-putting

, because you disagree with how I am handling this, but that is irrelevant to my alignment, the goal is to determine whether I am reacting in a way that is

genuine

. And I'm quite certain that going ballistic in response to a push is antithetical to survival but is really the only option I have when I think someone is pushing me in a scummy way.


The thing is, I

am

defending myself here, but implosion's case on me is terrible and is so insubstantial that there's very little to respond to, so of course I go on the attack, because I believe he's pushing me for scum motivated reasons. What points of his do you believe I haven't addressed?

[catboi]

could you potentially link the game?
fair enough though i didnt notice there was another setup with jailkeeper, my bad on that, but why would goon igor fakeclaim tracker here though? its a very high risk high reward claim thus it could be worthwhile i guess, but considering he claimed when there was hardly any pressure on him whatsoever what motive does he have? maybe theres an argument to be made that theres equal scum motivation as there is town motivation behind his claim but at that point its just unnecessary cautiousness

viewtopic.php?f=11&t=86289 This was the game, the circumstances were slightly different as marcistar claimed tracker on day 2, after there was a blocked kill so mafia would know that it was the setup with a jailkeeper. But it only dawned on me that the tracker claim could be fake on day 4 and I had to fight like hell to get out of it.


I agree with what you're saying about the improbability of the claim, it all seems very farfetched and is something of a tinfoil theory on my part, the whole routine from igorsprite day 1 seems antithetical to how scum would approach it but my impression of his play is that he's trolly/unorthodox and might be prone to doing unexpected things as either alignment. It's also likely that if he was scum who carried the kill he'd know the jailkeeper was on him. I also just find he's leaning into the clueless newbie act maybe a little too much, always asking for help.

I'm not even suggesting he should be eliminated today, I think that would be mechanically poor play, but I should emphasize that he's not necessarily clear here.

[catboi]

im not saying there are any points of his you missed i just dislike (the self-admitted) omgus, feels unnatural but i might have a skewed view on how town would defend themselves

Well, ultimately I have to make a judgment call as to whether or not his push on me is coming from a town POV, and I don't believe it is.

also those arent "slightly different circumstances," a guaranteed jailkeeper leaves a lot of room to fakeclaim rather than doing what scum!igor could do but nevertheless i get it

And I recognize that, I'm not advocating for voting igorsprite today. The circumstances of the claim would be fairly risky for mafia. But I don't want people shutting their brains off solely on the basis of a claim, which happens too often. If you look at igorsprite's posts after the claim, I think there's good reason to say he's suspect, if not outright scummy. Again, not saying you should flip him now but he should be given scrutiny.

Who else would you want to go for, MafMen? I feel like I have good reasons to not vote everyone else in the game right now (obviously at least one of those is wrong but etc). My 2nd guess right now would be StrangeMatter but I am quite afraid that that's just me biased because pseudoAristotle didn't have as much time to towntell. StrangeMatter themself on their play alone I have no strong opinion on atm.

Nah, Strange has been fine, the fact that you'd even look there suggests you're not really reading into their posts. Which is a theme with you.

What "feeling"? Give me some sort of words here, or even literally quote a post you found suspect.

it's secret u.u

joking, i don't remember when i started to sus you .-.

oh i remember now, was this post

Whatever, not going to dwell on it.

it's only whatever for the mafia >.>

Okay, you realize that, at that time, under the assumption you had made a misplay, there was no point in me complaining about it? It's not like yelling at you after the fact would have given you a report. There was nothing to be gained by dwelling on it and any further display of emotion over it would have been entirely performative. (never mind that, at that moment, I was actively starting to suspect you were possibly fakeclaiming because I found not submitting a report to be hard to believe)

[catboi]

Actually, I'll just outright say it: implosion should know better than to scumread me here. Screw the self-deprecation.

He asks "how am I supposed to work with you", but his read on me

gives me nothing to work with

. The goal here is to paint me as unreasonable when in fact he is the one not trying to reason with me and is only concerned with flipping me. There was never any attempt to work with me on his part.

I feel very similarly to this in the other direction. catboi-town should know better than to scumread me here.

Like, what do I even gain as scum by voting for them in this way, when I'm basically universally townread. Why would I not just chill, especially in a newbie game. Like, honestly I can see catboi being suspicious of me as a result of this but the way they've gone essentially scorched earth just doesn't make any sense. I still am not sure they're scum! I feel like I've made that clear though maybe I haven't. The biggest of my reasons for voting them is PoE. Sure they're allowed to examine my vote and call it scummy. But like, they're just so quick to jump to absolute certainty that I'm scum to the point that they're all-capsing to demand people lim me after they die. I just don't buy that that's genuine.

What you gain as scum by voting me is PUSHING A MISFLIP THERE IS ALREADY MOMENTUM TOWARD BECAUSE OF IGOR'S AWFUL FAKE GUILTY. As scum, you NEED TO GET TOWNIES ELIMINATED TO WIN. So I don't buy whatsoever the notion that you'd "just chill" here - you need to push someone and I've very conveniently been made a target. Getting rid of another SE is beneficial because it's significantly easier to control newbies in an endgame situation. You've set up your "POE", the strength of which frankly reeks of TMI townreads, and you have to vote in a way that's consistent with that.


If you were actually not certain about me being scum, what have you actually done to solve me? Because so far the answer has been trying to flip me.

[catboi]

I feel very similarly to this in the other direction. catboi-town should know better than to scumread me here.

I guess I started writing this post thinking catboi should know my meta better than to think that this kind of thing is scum-indicative from me but that's probably not true since we haven't played in a while and only a few games (i think?) and my train of thought kind of wandered from there so let me rephrase this for clarity:

catboi-town should know better than to lockscum me here.

We haven't played that much in games that are recent/relevant, but I refuse to believe you come after me with such awful reasoning as town.

[catboi]

Then there is the shitpush on implosion. He wants us to buy that implosion is making a bad-faith, non-genueine push on

him

, while also making posts like this:

could make a snide comment about the proofreading fail on that post being scum-indicative, but that's over the top and i don't actually believe that

How else I am expected to take a post like that, other than "please give me towncred for not using something I don't actually think is NAI to push implosion, but I'm still going to point out the thing I think is NAI, and maybe someone else will think it's scum-indicative." That's one example. 484 is another. I think someone is making a bad-faith shitpush here, but it isn't implosion.

VOTE: Catboi

That post you quoted isn't even part of my actual reasoning for pushing implosion as scum, and I think that should be eminently clear if you're actually reading what I'm saying. 484 is an entirely fair criticism of implosion's push on me and you don't even bother trying to explain what's wrong with it (because there is no argument). I have made it very clear that I do not believe his vote on me here comes from a town thought process. You're not actually engaging with the substance of what I'm saying.

And again, you think I just slam back at the person who's mostly universally townread as scum? That trying to flip him with a "shitpush" is likely to succeed?

Please

. The idea is ludicrous.

[catboi]

I suspect Val is voting me mostly because I wounded his pride by suspecting him on day 1. I got caught up in a bad assumption and heavily disliked his logic for pushing Greeting as scum but my feeling over the night phase is it's more likely to be borne of stubborn egotism than scum motivating. *shrug*

[catboi]

...val. VAAAAAL.


Mind explaining THIS:

Spoiler:

- He's dumping this game again as VT for an even future scum game (worse than last time because of how last time went)
- This is that future game where he's scum (cashing in on the last game to take this town down)

Frankly, I agree in princible that claiming VT as early as this is an objectivley poor play as town; James obviously disagrees, but that's where I am at.

I don't see why claiming VT is good for scum though - In other words, I'm not sure; whether it's this game or a future one, how claiming VT helps a scum!James take down town. Nobody else is following his example, and a scum!James know he aint a town PR by definition.

Would you explain why you think an early VT claim as scum helps scum (I know why an early VT claim

as town

helps scum), if you think I've missed something?

Given you agree this was "objectively poor for town", then unless you can point to activity that is more objectively bad for town, my vote lands here.

That's fine. My point was that, although it's objectively anti-town, it looks to me to be just as anti-scum, too. My question to you was 'what advantage does scum gain by an scum making an early VT claim', and since your answer has been focus on about how we should be discouraging anti-town behavior and you don't want to move your vote until you see something else anti-town, I'll take it that you can't see the advantage for scum either.

CLSR has it right - I think it's anti-scum, in that it both attracts attention to the slot; and it basically locks at least one scum out of fake claiming a PR; and I would argue that is true whether it's double goon or not.

Yes, it's anti-town. Yes, that behavior should be discouraged, and has been. I think it's just as anti-scum though, and therefore I think we should be viewing anyone using this as the main or only justifaction for a wagon on James with a little bit of suspicion.

In here you have a previous game where you expressed belief that someone claiming VT early, while anti-town, is also lacking in scum motivation. And yet, in THIS game that was your justification for pushing Greeting as scum, talking about how claiming VT "isn't hekpful". How do you square these beliefs?

[catboi]

also those arent "slightly different circumstances," a guaranteed jailkeeper leaves a lot of room to fakeclaim rather than doing what scum!igor could do but nevertheless i get it

And I recognize that, I'm not advocating for voting igorsprite today. The circumstances of the claim would be fairly risky for mafia. But I don't want people shutting their brains off solely on the basis of a claim, which happens too often. If you look at igorsprite's posts after the claim, I think there's good reason to say he's suspect, if not outright scummy. Again, not saying you should flip him now but he should be given scrutiny.

so we don't need to discuss that today, i think that you are just saying that to put the town in doubt

Yes, igor, I am very definitely trying to put people in doubt! That's the point! Do you think me putting doubt on you is at all useful if I'm going to flip red?

[catboi]

Is it, though? MafMen unvoted me but I didn't really expect that as a consequence, most folks are writing it off or doubling down. Voicing suspicion of you has been overall quite bad for my survival this game!

[catboi]

I wasn't pushing Greeting for claiming VT.

No, you very obviously were.

A claimed tracker at this stage is far from ideal, but if you are town, and right not I think that's such a huge ask for me to beleive, you running around basically rolecoping yourself for scum, and throwing around such wild and anti-town plays with every other breath isn't helping very much, is it?

"running around basically rolecoping yourself for scum"

This was your criticism, directed at Greeting, who you were pushing for elimination. Don't lie.

This is not desperation, I am trying to make sense of your posting and determine whether you are doing this as town or scum.

[catboi]

As it stands, the dynamic between implosion and val where they've locktowned each other on a very flimsy basis is basically never T/T, I lean toward implosion being scum there and val being merely a stubborn egotist but I had to go digging in his past games to see if there was any discernible pattern in his townplay that might give me a sense of his alignment this game, and I happened upon those posts which are stating beliefs that seem to contradict how he's acted this game, so I had to question him on it.

[catboi]

What makes this difficult, frankly, is that I have a strong visceral dislike for the way Val posts that clearly clouds my judgment there.

[catboi]

Hell, might as well go all in trying pull out what I can: Val, why the townread on implosion? You came into the game initally suspecting him but then reversed course and seem to have settled on him as a townread coinciding somewhere around where he declared you town, but have never elaborated on that at all. What's going into that read, exactly?

[catboi]

You just so happened to miss all of those posts while going through my ISO looking for 282?

I haven't even looked through the entire thing myself, but I think my point is sufficiently made already.

No, it's not really made any point at all, and everything I said day 1 still stands, you keep making arguments about how Greeting is anti-town (a notion I quite disagree with) but fail to bridge the gap to how he is scum for talking about the setup or claiming early. The past you would have agreed with me. I don't see how a game where T3 openly gamethrew changes the nature of what actions have town/scum motivation to them.

(for the record, I searched your ISO for that post I quoted in particular, because it stuck in my mind).

People don't say "I think Val is town", twice, while continuing to shade that town player unless you need other slots to wonder about the rest of said players reads after you flip red.

Val, I am trying to sort you. My guess is that you are town. I am not certain. I am trying to test your reasoning here. To see if it holds up. What good does shading you accomplish if I am flipping scum?

[catboi]

546.

Desperatation intensifies.

I could make a comparable list for implosion, too, but the same basic deal applies, although there is a more fundermental disagreement there in that he thinks Greeting is town.

That is not a reason. That is just saying "yes, I agree with implosion", there is no substance here at all.

I am not "desperate", I am

trying

to get you to explain yourself, if you are town then you are being profoundly unhelpful by adopting this attitude.

Like, look: I am not voting you. I have not even called you scum. I have even said I may have been wrong on you day 1! But I'm not sure, and to that end I am questioning you. Trying to shut this down is helpful to absolutely no one. It doesn't help me read you, it doesn't help anyone else read you.

[catboi]

At this point, catboi you're confirmation biasing yourself (or that's what it seems like you're doing) into believing Implosion is scum.

Maybe. Wouldn't be the first time. But I have to make a judgment call on whether the people pushing me are scum or town.

[catboi]

Like Val, you write a, essay every time you post, and the most you can come up with for implo-town is "I agree with what he's saying"?

Surely

you're capable of a little more depth than that?

[catboi]

What, specifically is he saying that you agree with? What makes these thoughts that scum wouldn't have? Use your words. Almost all your reads are pure reciprocity: those who support me are towny, those who are against me are scum. You've played enough you ought to know that's not how the game works. I'm trying to understand why you're certain this is a genuine connection and not just someone expressing, say, sensible surface level thoughts that are easy to agree with.

[catboi]

At this point, catboi you're confirmation biasing yourself (or that's what it seems like you're doing) into believing Implosion is scum.

Maybe. Wouldn't be the first time. But I have to make a judgment call on whether the people pushing me are scum or town.

Noooo never say judgement call! You invoke

his

ability of being completely wrong!!!

I don't understand what you mean by this.

[catboi]

'Hell, might as well go all in on spreading as much shade as possible since I'm probably getting limmed here. UnCCd PR claims, slots I've said I think are town but I don't like, anyone is fair game'.

Do you actually think this is what scum close to elimination does? Just make an enemy of everyone and seal my fate? Do you see scum do this in games you've played?

Further, do you actually think I'm shading "anyone"? I've actually been quite specific in who I've directed my attention to here. I'm also not "shading" you, I'm questioning you! My approach to you is significantly different from how I responded to implo where I basically just called him lockscum for scumreading me.

And why are you acting like an un-cc'd PR is confirmed town in a multi-setup? I've already explained the scenario where it's possible for the claim to be fake. Is there something in igorsprite's posting, aside from the claim, that makes you assume he absolutely has to be town here?

[catboi]

Catboi : Don't trust their reads, especially the multiple they've swung quite significantly on in a way I don't understand. They've had MafMen as scum, to town when his train eased, back to scum as this day starts because apparently they rethought that read overnight. They've soft shaded Val a few times without doing anything about it, like they're interested in voting Val but only later on and if they see enough support. Their push on me right now is reasonable if they

are

town, I get it, but in combination with everything else, I think I'm just a player on the edge of a few townreads who named catboi as a potential sus yesterday and isn't going to make them look bad if they push me.

Catboi, if you want engagement, can you tell me about your MafMen read throughout the game? Why has it changed when it has?

I'm voting catboi here and they'll be at E-1. Would be nice if greeting caught up and answered some questions before we get to a hammer
VOTE: catboi

Sorry, I saw your reads list but wound up passing it over because I got sidetracked due to igorsprite's fake guilty on me.

So, with regard to MafMen: at first I felt that his posting in the early game was too focused on commentary (e.g. 19 24 25 37). Experience and gut tells me oftentimes scum will focus on these sort of mechanical type posts over ones which actually advance the game. That was why I voted him initially. Then, the early townread on Greeting in 49 felt TMI-ish, given Greeting hadn't said all that much worthy of a townread on him. So I supported the wagon on him. As the day went on, I felt like him totally ignoring the wagon was probably more likely to come from town, and I was agreeing with him a lot about disliking the way Val was pushing greeting. In the moment, all his reactions felt "right". Overnight, I wavered on that read because I felt like I might have been wrong about Val, and because in another game I encountered a player who as scum spent most of his time arguing against a townie who was posting ridiculous theories. It's very easy to position yourself as the "correct" one in an argument with a townie who is being illogical, and my fear was that was what MafMen was doing. However, when I brought this up at the start of the day, I didn't really hate his response to me in 390, so I got the sense my paranoia was unwarranted. The way he backed off me with at first going "I still sus you" and then following with a sort of "argh I don't know"

looks

like town genuinely wrangling with doubt.


Now, all that being said: why do you find my wavering back and forth on my read of MafMen to be actually scummy? What's the scum motivation there, rather than me simply being town who's indecisive on their read?

[catboi]

Mmmmm, it may be egotism at play again but I suspect scum are going all-in trying to elim me here. Wish I could tell out of the 4 which is which.

[catboi]

Why? I see them as very neutral really, they attempted to mediate between me and Val89 in 186 and later posts. Mafia really have little reason to do such thing. It sounds like a low-risk low-reward kind of deal lol.

"very neutral" is, at the least, a beneficial way for scum to play. Him "mediating" between you two looks nice but he doesn't really attempt to diffuse the tension between you at all, he's just kind of let it fester while not getting involved too much.

And that's not even to say I'm confident his approach there makes him scum, I'm just not sure it makes him town, you know?

[catboi]

Let's go in further here

Greeting : I've publicly gone back and forth on him. I don't consider the self hammer announcement to be necessarily town but now his posting since then has been weird. In my PoE but probably third.

What about Greeting's posting is "weird", and why do you find that to be potentially scum-indicative?

Implosion : Really widely townread and I agree. Asks a lot of incisive questions and makes his own thoughts clear at the right times. If you're scum, you're really great at it! :'D

That last line here is a real :thinkingemoji: What questions of implosion's are "incisive"? What about "making his own thoughts clear" is a towntell exactly? Why don't scum want to make their thoughts clear?

MafMen: Still think the argument that his first few posts were bad holds water and I haven't actually seen anything from him since that makes me townread. Pushing Val today is dumb and looks like scum grabbing at what they think is a viable train, since he's been controversial.

Why do you see val as a "viable train", when exactly three people have expressed suspicion of him, and you're scumleaning everyone doing it? Who do you think is going to make Val a potential elim here?

Val89 : His outspoken-ness is a playstyle thing for sure but I think it's been placed correctly and good for town since he's swapped in. If he were scum, his play so far would have only been hurting himself and placing a massive target on his back. Have not seen reasonable explanation as to how he makes sense as scum.

Has it placed a target on him, though? He's not even come close to being an elimination. Wouldn't "being outspoken" and "placing a massive target on his back" equally describe me? What do you think he's done that's "placed correctly" and "good for town"? This is all very vague.

[catboi]

moving my vote to avoid hammer

VOTE: Greeting

I don't really think there was any danger of me getting hammered early, but it's appreciated.

Greeting, can you please respond to my question to #468, please?

(Also on a side note I still haven't been able to figure out how to link to my other posts yet, I get how it works though)

just use [post] tags, like so:

Code: Select all

[post]468[/post]

Note that you shouldn't include the #, just the number, or it'll link to post #468 made on the entire forum, rather than post 468 from this topic.

[catboi]

I entirely hate the direction of where this game is. I don't disagree with the idea of Eliminate All Liars, but I feel like it's the type of mantra (according to the wiki at least) that gets easily abused by scum. Also, I feel like this isn't abnormal that as scum, catboi could be completely lying about not doing anything as well to cover for themselves.

Strange, I'm kind of confused because you apparently hate the direction of the game but I'm not sure what direction you actually want the game to be headed in. What's up?

[catboi]

And correct me if I'm wrong, since multiple people have said this, didn't Igor say that he lied, so then it's not a contradiction?

As for what you've said catboi, I'd have preferred not to talk much about PRs lest we help mafia (I've personally as scum used things like this to catch PRs before), and made reads. Of course that's not where the game went, and I don't think I can even move it away anymore so here we are, and I thought I might as well join in and get reads that way.

I mean, well, I'm not talking about PRs anymore but it was sort of unavoidable given that I was forced to claim. But I am trying to make reads now, as are most people. Do you have thoughts right now? I assume you not wanting me at E-1 means you think I'm town, although that might be presumptive on my part.

[catboi]

Well, I could have selfhammered if I was going to, but as a rule I basically almost never selfvote as either alignment, unless I'm mechanically guiltied as scum. So you shouldn't take that as alignment-indicative.

What about my framing do you think is "a common scum defense"?

[catboi]

Well, I could have selfhammered if I was going to, but as a rule I basically almost never selfvote as either alignment, unless I'm mechanically guiltied as scum. So you shouldn't take that as alignment-indicative.

What about my framing do you think is "a common scum defense"?

When I looked at it I felt like it went very much along the lines of this. When you have believe or know you've been inspected as scum, you lie and say they are lying themselves and push them. Of course there is the time where scum also fakes an inspect on someone (though I think this is pretty rare), and Town does a similar thing to push back against it.

But, the thing is, as scum I would know his guilty is a bluff, so I wouldn't have had to push back on it ,right? Further, why is me being scum the default assumption here, when as town I don't know whether the guilty is a test or scum trying to get me eliminated by faking a check? What do you think town does differently in response to a fake guilty?


Really me having to defend against this confirmation biased reasoning is the #1 lesson in why faking guilties is trash:

regardless of what I do or say, people are going to interpret it as a response affirming my guilt

. There's absolutely no way I can win here and it's incredibly tilting to deal with.

[catboi]

The act of saying "well just bring me to e-1 so i can selfhammer then" has not much utility for scum to say. I think that kind of second-level "doing something explicitly negative utility for the town cred" play happens not that often.

I agree with this generally, it can be manipulated by a certain archetype of player but I don't particularly have reason to think that Greeting is that sort of player yet. The continued tunnel on igorsprite is also one that's just sort of negative utility for scum to actually be pursuing at this point.

[catboi]

yeah in all honesty i wouldnt be surprised if scum!greeting pushes igor here so they can spend their nk on better prospects

I don't, really: in that scenario I think greeting puts himself at a disadvantage where igorsprite is always going to be opposed to him even if he's left alive and people are ~always going to side with him over igorsprite.

In fact I'd say in a igor-town world scum would have more or less recognized he's the type of player who is incredibly easy to manipulate by staying on his good side and would be doing that exclusively.

[catboi]

Responding to some of 588. If you consider giving reads without citing specific posts to be vague, then sure. I was asked to give an overview of everyone.

Okay, and I asked you to elaborate on your stances, so just do that, don't give me this sass.

Re: doubting my strong town reads, you said yourself that a large part of reading people is determining whether you think their actions are genuine or not, and from my pov I think that's been very apparent of Implosion and Val. (

Both of their reactions to greeting yesterday made sense

and Val's doesn't come from scum, implosion arguing with you today he was genuinely not sure what to do but believed your reactions to be scum indicative.) I understand why they're doing the things they're doing, generally, and it seems reasonable and in line with a town agenda.

But their reactions to Greeting were entirely the opposite. How do they both come across as "making sense" when they have completely different reactions? What do you understand about what they're doing? It can't be that hard to point to a single thing, right?

See above, but also goes back to the "keeping your options open." We all change our minds sometimes, especially as we get new information, but scum can change their opinion of a player whenever they want based on what looks best and helps them the most, since they have alternate motivations. MafMen was a train that worked for a while, died down, and now he's back as an option, just like your read of him.

Plus the chance that MafMen is your partner who you rvs-ed to distance from, he messed up, and now you're leaving room to bus him if needbe. :T

Is MafMen an option? No one's voting him.

I

haven't voted him. I already said I thought his response was town-leaning. And, again, he's your second highest scumread, so how does that make any sense at all?

You're super dodging actually answering my questions here and only giving completely vague justification, this really isn't good enough at all. Why can you not answer very simple questions about your own reads?

Here, I'm going to repeat every question I asked that you blatantly dodged, until I get an answer:

- What about Greeting's posting is "weird", and why do you find that to be potentially scum-indicative?

- What questions of implosion's are "incisive"? What about "making his own thoughts clear" is a towntell exactly? Why don't scum want to make their thoughts clear?

- Why do you see val as a "viable train", when exactly three people have expressed suspicion of him, and you're scumleaning everyone doing it? Who do you think is going to make Val a potential elim here?

- Has it placed a target on him, though? He's not even come close to being an elimination. Wouldn't "being outspoken" and "placing a massive target on his back" equally describe me? What do you think he's done that's "placed correctly" and "good for town"?

[catboi]

VOTE: frogsfrogs


Until I get some satisfactory answers to my questions.

[catboi]

FWIW there was a certain wounded quality to implo's posting toward me last night that felt real but it's not anything I'd hang my hat on and I still have huge problems with how he's approaching the game, not sure if my response got too wrapped up in tilt, did think him basically breaking it off with me and looking to discuss other things was okay, didn't hate his last post although it's not anything that's a super hard observation for scum to make.

[catboi]

Yes, they were opposite, but I think both were very internally consistent, seemed real, and are anchored in town logic. That's my point here. I consider the roleset strategizing to be probably a bad move, but implosion never thought it was an issue. He makes a post about this just after Val's entrance, 134, but then he's gone for the next few pages wherein greeting/val/mafmen argue. When he comments again, he says he still thinks the same way about the strategizing being fine, but that Val looks super townie for how he's reacted, 183 and 186, and he pushes back at greeting to try and convince him of this, too. I think 188 and 191 are both great examples-- he feels really strongly about this read and is trying to wrangle the both of them into stepping back and seeing what he sees. I think it's genuine and don't see why appealing to greeting is good for scum here, when it's a situation easily jumped on, either. Val I've spoken about before-- I really believe this is something he was irritated by after knowing it to have happened in a game already, given the depth of explanation he gives and the emotional progression as he and greeting argue. 156 as a specific example if you'd like.

Okay, this at least makes

sense

, but I don't think, necessarily, that getting worked up over a play being mechanically correct/incorrect is a surefire tontell - very few players are going to strongly argue in favor of play they believe to be mechanically incorrect as scum and val has demonstrated the ability to attack a townie over the townie doing mechanically un-optimal things in a prior game. What you're saying at least makes ~sense in that implosion trying to mediate there is disadvantageous as scum but I see basically no reason val wouldn't be able to do what he's doing as scum.

I have the unfortunate, maybe emotional :/, reaction of feeling like some of this is attempting to make me doubt my own understanding of the game state. Genuinely, this and my own life schedule are why I did not respond fully before. It's not questioning that's the issue, but these two questions seem like no matter what I answer, you can jump on me for it. You know already I don't trust your motivations in this game, here, but apologies anyways if I can't fully see these as 100% good faith.

Going into this day I totally thought there could have been a push for Val. As you mention, there are three pretty strong scum reads of him, we had no idea of StrangeMatter's reads (plus they gave an ambivalent one of him shortly before Maf voted), I didn't realize implosion's townread was as strong as it actually is upon re-read (Guess I had the impression it faded a bit over time?), and igor has, a few times, voted very quickly for someone after a case is made for them being scum. It's not as viable currently as I thought it was, sure. As for MafMen, I absolutely think he's still an option? I'm of the impression he's the second-most widely scumread. I'm aware thinking that you two could be the maf team and that you want to vote out MafMen is odd, but I fully believe either could be true. Thus PoE.

Shrug, I'm trying to make you JUSTIFY your understand of this because I need to grasp your perspective. It feels like you are quite literally only looking at this from possible angles where I am scum, and have put basically no consideration into worlds where I am town, so I don't really care for the emotional appeal at the start of this. Anyway, I'm not even

trying

to convince you of anything at this points - my questions are squarely aimed at trying to sort you.

Those answers are annoyingly meh though and I'm not really getting anything out of them. I probably should have asked better questions because this was realistically the only response you could have given, but blah.

Ultimately the entire reasoning here is paper-thin, your justification for suspicion is based solely on me suspecting those people and you believing those two to be "viable" wagons, when I've actively pushed for neither so far today, and none of this actually addresses why I can't, like, be suspecting those people as town, right? Like there's no attempt to actually engage with my suspicion/reasoning at all and whether it's believable coming from town, it's just saying I suspected people who could be wagoned so I must be scum for it, it's like saying 2+2 = 5, it doesn't add up.

Majorly, his suspicion of Igor. :T I truly think it's a silly opinion, especially that he's still holding it now, even if you disagree with his plays.

Does weird = scum? What benefit does Greeting-scum get from suspecting igorsprite here? Do you think that is a play scum is likely to make?

Implosion has frequently contributed to discussions in ways that moves discussion along and he does it in ways I think are good for town and agree with. Obviously this is subjective, but like, the inverse of saying x player is scummy for going down distracting rabbit holes and saying things just for saying them. 438, 344, getting back to questioning Maf in 69 are good imo. I think it's less plausible that this is a brilliant scum performance than just being townie.

All of the questions cited are really unconvincing, asking igorsprite what his tracker report was is super easy for scum to do, as is asking MafMen why he thought greeting was probtown, especially seeing as multiple people jumped on him for that post, so I see that question as not super original or incisive at all? Which leaves only the question to thynhith, which, sure, could be plausibly scumhunting-ish but ultimately we know for a fact it's just attacking a townie for being incorrect n something.

Ultimately I'm not really seeing at all how the stuff you cited adds up to a solid townread, the earlier stuff about trying to mediate was more convincing.

See above x2. Honestly I think your own outspoken-ness has been mostly reactive and I disagree that it hasn't been something scum could do. Val's way of making enemies and scum hunting is, again, less plausible to me as a scum move than him just actually being town.

This is, again, super vague and unsatisfactory. I've been reactive because I got fake guiltied by a troll who isn't trying to play the game and people are using my response as justification for my own guilt. None of that is explicitly clearing, I'd be righteously pissed off as scum too, but if my response is to just sling mud at everyone voting me that just gets me killed. I've been

trying

to re-center and play more logically and that's the entire purpose behind my questioning of you, because I'm trying to get a handle on your alignment.

Like, the entire response here just boils down to "I disagree" but I entirely think there's viable scum motive in aggressively pushing people the way Val does, and his entire play has, in my view, been tunneling likely town players on terrible logic. It's not particularly

hard

to do as scum and there's a lot of scum incentive in operating how he does where he seemingly tries to discredit everyone who opposes him.

That's not even to say I think he's definite scum, I have basically no idea how to make sense of him as either alignment, because in both cases I think he just hard tunnels on bad reasoning, and I don't really have a good sense of how to tell them apart.

[catboi]

This is super annoying though because I thought I had you pegged as newb-scum who can write ~reasonable sounding posts but can't back them up with real reasoning or justification when pressed on it. I find a lot of your answers unsatisfactory and vague but not necessarily impossible to be coming from town, and the way you replied gives me some level of doubt, leaving me a bit unsure what to do. I was totally primed to go full aggressive tunnel on you and call you caught scum for dodging questions.

[catboi]

Ultimately if you are town here, frogsfrogs, you're the type of player who gets hyperfocused on a particular worldview where you see someone as scum and view all their actions in the least charitable light while not showing the empathy to consider a possible perspetive where those actions could be coming from town. I think this sort of thing usually just leads to bad tunneling but becomes correctable with enough experience to understand other people's perspectives and how they think about things.

[catboi]

@implosion

- let's chat. I'm sorry if you felt my response to you yesterday was out of bounds.

I know you're not a bad player. Not sure if you're aware I'm Gira? (this alt's outed now, shrug). I understand maybe you'd be down on yourself after white flag, but, like, there was a lot of issues there that wasn't really your fault. Anyway, I know we weren't really close back in the day or anything but I'd like to think that if you're town you'd at least make a serious effort to engage with my perspective here and try to sort me.


That's why you coming at me today with sloughed-off POE reasoning set me off, because it's the sort of thing that is really easy to hide behind as scum. Did set off warning sirens in the memory banks of the reasoning scum-you had in guardians of the fortress where you were working off too-easy townreads that were built on a foundation of nothing much at all. It's like logical shortcutting, I sort of suspect you have trouble pushing cases you know are incorrect? So instead you work based on townreads, which you can feel justified in knowing are correct, nd then just cite POE as a reason to push mis-elims. So it set me off really hard when you came at me based on stuff like me being outed as a VT claim and my reaction to a fake guilty, which should absolutely be NAI at worst. It's all super lazy reasoning and I think you're better than that.

But regardless if you are town here I'd like to be able to find you and your responses to me screaming for your head gave me some measure of doubt so I want to discuss everyone else with you and see if it makes some level of sense, you're the one person here I feel like I

should

be able to connect with in some way if you're town here given we've been at this for a long time and started in the same place. I think figuring out your alignment is going to be key to my perspective on this game but to do that I really need to get your head here because there's clearly a disconnect between how we're viewing the game and i'm not sure if that's a sign of you being scum or not.

[catboi]

ultimately both igorsprite and val89 are the two archetypes of newbies I just find to be unbelievably frustrating to deal with - in spite of obvious stylistic differences neither is able to see the game outside themselves to any meaningful degree. Any questioning of their views is met with blunt resistance and treated as a threat, Val slagging me off as "desperate" for simply questioning his viewpoint is especially grating.

If both are town here then I suspect the game is as good as lost so I really have to hope that isn't the case here, don't know what else I can do.

[catboi]

I've known you were someone from EM but I was never quite sure exactly who/I perennially confuse which account from each site corresponds in what way.

I can re-evaluate frogs (and catch up generally) tomorrow but don't have the energy/focus to right now; who else do you think should be in my scum pool that isn't?

I'm not really interested in forcing a particular perspective, my own view of the game right now is extremely unsettled and my goal here is to read

you

, not convince you of anything necessarily. To do that I need to just talk about your reads/reasoning on other players and see if it makes sense - you've said some stuff I agree with but not necessarily anything that's not, like, an easy thought to have. I dunno it's 2:40 AM so I can't find the right words but I guess I just want to go deeper here.

I'd at least like to get your thoughts on my questioning of frogs/their responses to me because I'm not sure what to make of it myself, I think it's fairly clear what I was digging at with those questions but the response is one where I can't really get a bead on it either way as to what it means for frogs' alignment.

[catboi]

"who should I be reading as scum that I'm not" as a response feels kind of :/

[catboi]

Ad I guess while we're at it, what's your view of mafmen? I just checked and you've said very little about him at all so your read of him isn't really clear at all.

[catboi]

one last thought because I literally can't get my mind off this game but don't think implo/val is the scumteam based on val's entrance, early distancing is possible but opening with a vote on a partner no one was suspecting at that point seems a very unlikely play so that at least is safe to rule out


forcing myself to log off and actually sleep now I just had to get that out there

[catboi]

If both are town here then I suspect the game is as good as lost so I really have to hope that isn't the case here, don't know what else I can do.

don't be pessimistic

you've shown basically no desire to take the game seriously, you claim you're here to learn but there's basically no attempts to engage with meaningful dialogue with other players, any attempts to discuss your own reasoning have you barely giving any effort in response, your actions ingame come across as someone who's bored more than anything. you strike me as someone who just isn't interested in the style of game here, period, and are basically impossible to work with. Maybe I'm wrong and have misjudged you but you've shown basically no concern for what anyone else thinks so far. Instead you just treat the game as your own sandbox to screw around in.

[catboi]

And while I'm at it, can't help but find the attempt to placate me from someone who is supposedly strongly scumreading me to be scummy.

In my experience scum often tend to want to make sure they're putting down people "gently" and act conciliatory toward the ones they're trying to kill, usually because they don't want to be seen as acting too harshly toward someone they know will flip town

kind of a microread, not sure how much stock to put in it, but felt it was worth calling out in the moment

[catboi]

Since this game is frustratingly dead I'm going to try to do some review. Had considered starting with MafMen, but as I asked implo his opinion of him I don't want to out any analysis on him before implo does so I can be sure his conclusions aren't influenced by mine at all. So instead I'm going to look over Greeting to see if I have the right idea or he's been in my blind spot all game.

Greeting:

I encountered Greeting in our previous game, I think there he became obvious town to me when he started complaining about the SEs in that game not doing much compared to his previous game. Was also fairly obvious town in his first game where he started scumhunting and putting in efforts to be helpful more or less right away.

I didn't really love the vote on margotrosa in 88, voting an inactive player is a fairly safe move that doesn't accomplish much, either they're going to start posting or they aren't but it's not like someone missing the start of the game is necessarily scummy, and as it turned out she'd flaked anyway. But it's not a guaranteed scum thing, town could legitimately think they're trying to force someone to post with that vote

The reasoning for going after igorsprite in 95/96 is actually meh, I can see town going after him based on how he was playing the early game but on a reread the lack of real explanation doesn't quite sit right with me

I don't know if it's my own bias speaking but in his previous games Greeting was able to present pretty fleshed out thoughts and I find the reads list in 96 a bit lacking, the exclusion of players who "sound like genuine newbies" and me as the least suspicious somehow reads rather arbitrary, the thoughts on mafmen are just that he "didn't sound very towny" but decides he's not as suspicious just because he's not likely to be a teammate to igorsprite, which is just bad associative reasoning that's dependent on igorsprite being scum, doesn't analyze mafmen's posts at all.

The 109 is also pretty weak reasoning, doesn't get at anything specific for clearing me or the other newbies, just that i'm "acting similarly" and the other newbies are "making newbie posts". I feel like in my skims of his previous games just before this Greeting had more fleshed out thoughts, but I'll have to check again after this.

The mechanical posts in 120 and 123 don't really bother me and are more or less consistent with how Greeting-town acted in his first game, but I don't really consider it a towntell at all and would expect he'd talk similarly as scum.

I actually like 140 as townish, the unease/hesitance toward implosion feels like believable paranoia and the way he talks about wanting to vote MafMen for sounding similar to a player who'd fooled him as scum sounds good. 141 stings a little because I had initially read post 50 as townish as well but second-guessed myself, something of the confidence in the read makes me afraid it's white-knighting but I don't think the reasons for Greeting's defense of Thyn are all that bad ultimately.

The sequence from 148/149/151/160 still looks town to me, feel like the confusion at val's accusation and the gradually increasing incredulity as he doubles down on extremely faulty/contradictory reasoning looks genuine.

Could it be scum getting miffed at an unreasonable accusation from a townie? Eh, I suppose. But it all looks town enough to me.

The attempting to check Val's posting history and feeling like what he's doing doesn't match with his other games in 169/171 is also a manuever I don't see newb-scum faking, bothering to even think about the meta angle is one most don't often bother with. Even the weird ridiculous angleshooty read where he speculates if Val could somehow be an unregistered hydra in 184 is one I don't see mafia making, ever?

I don't really like the rabbit hole associative read in 185 but if I had to guess it's a town post. Not strongly though.

Something about talking about the game being brought to a "harmful frenzy" in 193 I also like, that kind of feeling of victimization comes way more often from town and isn't often faked by mafia, particularly inexperienced ones. Generally speaking that type of thinking where they're perceiving things people are doing as plots and threats comes from the paranoid mindset of a townie.

The emotive threat to selfhammer in 204 left me conflicted. Greeting was mis-eliminated in his first game and came under pressure in the game we played together and he didn't react that way when he got heat in those games. But this is also a different game and it's possible he got tired of being pushed on. His explanation for it when I asked was related to his confidence in Val being scum. In general I think this sort of threat comes from frustrated town more often than scum, though, and the type of player who does it as a ploy is rare - I don't think Greeting has encountered anyone like that in his previous games so my guess would be this is genuine town frustration leading to the threat rather than a bluff.

234 asking about Thynhith does ping a bit.

235 trying to call out frogs for being online but not posting is also a type of angle-shoot read I almost never see from scum, ever, and I'm glad I went back and reread to remind myself of that. Bothering to investigate the activity of someone random while in the midst of a 1v1 with val indicates a genuine scumhunting mindset here, scum can and will use getting in a fight with a townie as an excuse to avoid commenting on the rest of the thread but Greeting isn't doing that, he's continuing to look around at other people even while locked in a tunnel on Val.

continuing after this but felt the last bit was a strong enough point to end the post on.

[catboi]

I have a question, Catboi what are your current thoughts on MafMen?

Lol, ironic, just said I was holding off on rereading him. I have a vague townlean based on him looking like he's dealing with legitimate indecision in his read on me (although that kind of thing can be an excuse to hold back for a bit only to vote me later), but that's a shaky foundation for a read, I want to look back more in depth sometime today.

[catboi]

greeting being self-aware about the self-hammer threat in 244 sort of weakens the credit for it, but I buy the line from him at the end: "It would be unlikely for me to do that in most games, but like I said multiple times before, I think this time it's worth it." In particular, egging on the votes in 250 makes me again think this is coming from town.

The re-quoting the post about setup stuff in 367 also doesn't feel like a play for towncred, more like Greeting legitimately believes that advice and feels the urgent need to make sure people see it.

The continued tunnel back on igorsprite out of distaste for him lying in 416 also feels like town, Greeting has previously said he thinks it's unlikely igorsprite is lying, I don't think he suddenly reverses on that read to a stance of extreme skepticism as scum. As previously stated, attacking igorsprite here is pure negative utility for scum because he's very unlikely to get voted by other players and would be more likely to track a player out of spite for daring to suspect him. The fact that he's continuing on with his suspicion of igorsprite as of 581 despite other players showing no interst is also townpoints - I would expect most scum players to have abandoned the push by now.

The weak defense of me in 619 is kind of meh, could see that post coming from scum wanting to stay off my wagon but I don't think one pingy post at the end counteracts the whole body of work.

So, yeah, although some of his early posts had me feeling unease,

I think Greeting is just town here and shouldn't be voted at any point.

I'm standing firm on that read.

[catboi]

Speaking of, to everyone on the Thyn wagon, what was the reason for their elimination? I feel like nobody really went through and talked about that, and I didn't really see anything that particularly pinged me.

Also, I absolutely didn't know that.

Implosion had made a point that he was casting a wide net of suspects for vague reasons, like talking about people being in a "dark triangle", and I agreed with that, his response to getting voted looked towny, I got too wrapped up in a theory about him and val shading each other but avoiding actually voting each other. I dunno, was regrettable in a lot of ways but making mistakes is part of the game.

Is there something you're looking for by asking this?

[catboi]

Okay, looking at greeting's reads in Newbie 2081, they don't seem all that different from this game, I think that clears up the one major point of doubt I had. Even had a similar read on kennyk that game seeming similar to their previous one.

[catboi]

you've shown basically no desire to take the game seriously, you claim you're here to learn but there's basically no attempts to engage with meaningful dialogue with other players, any attempts to discuss your own reasoning have you barely giving any effort in response, your actions ingame come across as someone who's bored more than anything. you strike me as someone who just isn't interested in the style of game here, period, and are basically impossible to work with. Maybe I'm wrong and have misjudged you but you've shown basically no concern for what anyone else thinks so far. Instead you just treat the game as your own sandbox to screw around in.

that always happens when i'm town, especially when i'm a PR ;.;

i tend to be more townie when i'm scum because i feel that i have an obligation to do and i know who are my partners so i don't need to be worried about who i trust, but when i'm town i just don't know what i have to do because i think that i can't trust anyone and it's even worse when i'm a PR because it's obvious to me that i'm town and i think that the others need to trust me no matter what.

sorry if you are town and i frustrated you, but whatever if you are scum

Rather than apologizing, I'd appreciate it if you tried actually communicating about your reads if you're town. keeping everything to yourself accomplishes nothing and is unfun to deal with. You say you think that you "can't trust anyone", is that true of the game right now?

[catboi]

do you think my strategy as scum is to accuse you here when that is very clearly unpopular? That me and my teammate go all in on trying to eliminate the

uncced tracker

when no one else wants to? The goal as scum is to get townies voted out and I probably wouldn't have tinfoiled you if I didn't think you were legitimately suspect

because you tried to fake a guilty on me

. Let's remember that was what kicked this off in the first place.

Has it occurred to you that scum might want to suck up to you because you're very easily manipulated? That you just treat anyone who takes your side as a friend? Like you'll ride in the car of any stranger who offers you candy?

[catboi]

And, anyway, as a thought exercise: I get voted out today and flip town. How does that affect your read of Greeting?

[catboi]

And, like, again, me doubting your claim cannot possibly have contributed to you

suspecting me so strongly you faked a damn guilty on me in the first place

. It makes no sense for you to have confidently scumread me enough to do that in the first place

[catboi]

Don't really want to rest any laurels on stale meta but am seeing mafmen-scum ca. 2018 had a tendency toward overconfident TMI townreads ythat I don't think he's exhibited here

[catboi]

Ultimately if you are town here, frogsfrogs, you're the type of player who gets hyperfocused on a particular worldview where you see someone as scum and view all their actions in the least charitable light while not showing the empathy to consider a possible perspetive where those actions could be coming from town. I think this sort of thing usually just leads to bad tunneling but becomes correctable with enough experience to understand other people's perspectives and how they think about things.

Sure, sure. I'm hearing you on this, and I'm not

ignoring

your reads or developing perspective either. I don't feel as locked into those opinions or as misinformed as you say. I just.. I don't know. I see what I see and I don't know how to make headway in the game if I'm too indecisive / go back and doubt my perceptions about that too much. If you get flipped today and are town, well :I .. I'll have to heed the warning and reread a bunch with that context.

If it helps, I'm coming back around to you probably being scum and your hemming and hawing being an act!

[catboi]

I'm a little confused here, catboi.

Are you still doubting igors claim, or no? If you are still suggesting you are harbouring doubts, I'll ask you the same question I asked Greeting: Why no kill last night?

I would have thought the scum utility to casting aspirsions on the tracker claim was obvious. If we are in A2, and I think it's pretty obvious we are here, as long as the roleblocker is alive, the tracker is useless as a tracker, and can't prove themselves either. The only utility that PR has currently is as a pseudo-innocent child, and if you can successfully cast aspersions on that too, well...

This reminds an awful lot of the time at the end of day 1 you tried to tell us there was no scum motivation to not concededing a townread, and that was patently false, too.

I am not voting or pushing igorsprite as scum currently, no. I am not entirely confident in that read but his responses today (irl day, not game day), have overall felt believable

[catboi]

Mmmm, I actually think, barring a drastic leveling up in his scumplay in the 3 years since he last played on MS (not impossible but highly unlikely), mafmen is just town here, not fully getting into details just yet but looking over his ISO again I feel good about that one. Will try to explain that one later tonight.


need to take a leap of faith on igorsprite but if I accept that there is a decent likelihood of the team within val/implo/frogs then I really just need to solve within implo/val if I rest on my read that they're unaligned.

[catboi]

I am not voting or pushing igorsprite as scum currently, no. I am not entirely confident in that read but his responses today (irl day, not game day), have overall felt believable

I wasn't asking you if you are pushing him as scum currently, I asked if you beleived his tracker claim. Given the fact you say you aren't entirely confident, I would like you to answer the question.

If Igor is scum, why no kill last night? Talk me through how that tallys with Igor being possibly scum for you.

I am not pushing igor as scum currently. I have no reason to discuss this. You are bogging this down with tired pedantry.

hypothetically

in an igor-scum world, the team had him perform the kill and the jailkeeper blocked him last night. It's not that simple. You have argued that the scumteam would not do this. In my view that's not super convincing, an inexperienced scumteam might not know they shouldn't have him make the kill, or maybe they were worried about the other member getting caught by the jailkeeper, there's a lot of potential explanations for night actions being handled differently, I doubt everyone subscribes to your view of the game.

ALL THAT BEING SAID, igorsprite is not currently part of my guess for the scumteam. I am no longer pushing igorsprite as scum. I have no desire to continue further with this line of speculation.

[catboi]

Has it occurred to you that scum might want to suck up to you because you're very easily manipulated? That you just treat anyone who takes your side as a friend? Like you'll ride in the car of any stranger who offers you candy?

so are you saying that val, frogsfrogs or implosion is manipulating me?

That's my current view of the game, yes.

[catboi]

Has it occurred to you that scum might want to suck up to you because you're very easily manipulated? That you just treat anyone who takes your side as a friend? Like you'll ride in the car of any stranger who offers you candy?

so are you saying that val, frogsfrogs or implosion is manipulating me?

That's my current view of the game, yes.

Are you manipulating me too?

I am attempting to persuade you to reconsider. I am trying to, as best as I can, go about the game rationally and evaluate players logically, making my thought process as apparent as possible. My hope is that even if I am voted out today that my reasoning is thorough enough that it provides a blueprint for town to win the game after I'm gone.


Where you draw the line between

persuasion

and

manipulation

is personal decision, and that's up to you. Ultimately I'd prefer to not get voted out by you but that would be true if I was mafia as well.

[catboi]

No, don't sit there and tell me you have just no idea why keeping the mislim pool as wide as possible is +scum. I know full well why scum!catboi would want not to discuss this and try and paint this very applicable point - whether an uncc'dd town PR can be eliminated from the suspect pool on D2 after a no-kill, is what we are talking about here, remember - as "tired pedantry", but town!catboi has every reason to engage here and help settle minds on the issue.

Val, buzz off. I don't think igorsprite is scum right now. In fact I currently think he said something recently I doubt he ever posts as scum. I have been making that clear in my posting. I am trying to work through and figure things out independently. You're trying to drag me into the muck over this nonsense arguing about a read I had on a player

I no longer actively suspect

rather allowing me to actually solve here. It's absurdly shitty to do, and accomplishes absolutely nothing given that you're already scumreading me and have made your points repeatedly, trying to hammer it in over and over is just argumentum ad nauseam.

I have expressed no desire to persuade you or work with you whatsoever, if you are town you are the sort of player whose mind is completely closed off and as such even attempting to talk to you is completely useless. There is nothing to be gained from me continuing to engage with you.

By and large I see no purpose for you to make these arguments other than to continue to discredit me by hyperfocusing on an argument you believe you can "win". It does not come across as being in good faith.

[catboi]

I am trying to, as best as I can, go about the game rationally and evaluate players logically, making my thought process as apparent as possible. My hope is that even if I am voted out today that my reasoning is thorough enough that it provides a blueprint for town to win the game after I'm gone.

Also Catboi:

No. I won't discuss my reasoning for my lack of confidence on my Igor read. I'm trying to tell you that I am town, but if I do get flipped and I end up being town, you will just have to figure it out for yourself tomorrow because I'm not talking about it now.

See the problem here?

What the fuck are you even talking about?

[catboi]

I am trying to solve. Val just wants to drag me into an argument over my read on igorsprite, which has been evolving, because he is treating this as a debate, where he is picking out one thing I said and trying to score "points" on it by attacking my reasoning. This leads to him polluting the thread trying to drown out me making actual reads.


I hope people will see what is happening, even if I have to get voted first.

[catboi]

I mean, in any sense, if I'm lockscum to val, why does he care about me mentioning I had doubt about igorsprite? Does he have any interest in my actual reasoning? Clearly not, because he's very convinced igorsprite is town.

Is he trying to convince me of his view of igorsprite? Again no, he thinks I'm scum and is trying to flip me.

So what's the purpose? He's trying to argue with me about a read

that I keep saying is not in my solve right now

. The only reason is he wants to "win" the argument from his fortress of unassailable logic, but I just...don't care. I have no reason to debate him over this, because it accomplishes nothing.

[catboi]

Praying Val is scum honestly because otherwise he's one of the most obnoxious players I've encountered in a decade

[catboi]

Can you post your current reads please, @Catboi?

town:
greeting, mafmen, igorsprite, strangematter


(big gap)

implosion


scum:
frogsfrogs, val89


I'm not totally sure on implosion yet. I feel like I'll be able to get a better handle on him from interacting with him. It's possible still he's just scum and I'm misreading one of the other people voting me out of annoyance but if I had to guess the team right now, that's where it's at.

I went into extensive detail on Greeting in my ISO of him, I doubt he's ever scum here.

MafMen is a combination of research on his old games and rereading his ISO in this one, am fairly confident on him being town this game, will try to go into detail later tonight when I have the time.

I know I said I wanted to wait for implo but in doing my own reading I started to feel pretty good about the read.

igorsprite is....I don't think he openly PR hunts in-thread as mafia

[catboi]

You aren't trying to solve - you are trying to keep the net as wide as possible.

No I'm not.

[catboi]

And please do specify.

Do you mean explain my reads? I went into a huge deep dive on Greeting not that long ago, IDK if you want me to link it again?

[catboi]

Is your assumption of Val and I as the scum team because you just find us individually scummy or do you think we've actually acted like we're in cahoots?

It is both because I find you to be acting like scum individually, where I have reasons to townread most of the other players, which I have discussed, and because I think you're compatible

[catboi]

And please do specify.

Do you mean explain my reads? I went into a huge deep dive on Greeting not that long ago, IDK if you want me to link it again?

Well, it is the most important part of reads if you ask me (and the part I suck the most at), but there really isn't a point in explaining it again.

No, no, it's fine, it's just that I've been spilling my guts in-thread for the past 2 days and I'm not sure if you missed it or not, I'm more than happy to link you things if you've missed them or explain my reads further if it's necessary.

[catboi]

Is your assumption of Val and I as the scum team because you just find us individually scummy or do you think we've actually acted like we're in cahoots?

It is both because I find you to be acting like scum individually, where I have reasons to townread most of the other players, which I have discussed, and because I think you're compatible

But, again, this is partly because I have an unaligned read on Val/implo based on val's opening the game with an attempted case of implosion, and that's really a soft read. I think it's possible I could be wrong on implosion because that's a weak guess I'm not at all confident in on an individual level, especially not without really rereading him.

I think implo is basically the only other possibility if I'm somehow wrong on you though.

[catboi]

There are, however, some things which concern me. I felt like there happened a spike in his activity when his wagon built up. Getting too defensive while being VT (they hardclaimed it) without any explanation seems odd. I find the ability to take risks with one’s own life as the peak of VT potential and I would expect an experienced player to know and understand that.

Nonetheless, we have a lying „newbie” and a polarising despot in the game which definitely managed to pick my attention and this is the direction that I’m facing.

For what it's worth when I learned the game I learned as town you should always fight as hard as you can against your own elimination as hard as possible and play to that maxim every game. Anecdotally I've been told the best thing you can do for your winrate as town in games is avoid being eliminated, which intuitively makes sense. I also know that in games, generally speaking,

everyone ignores the reads of the person they voted out

- it's like people have some notion of punishing the townie for acting scummy that they decide to ignore everything they said

That being said if I do get voted out I want to leave the best possible legacy reads I can and try to nail the exact team so me dying here won't be entirely in vain

Im fairly sure my extended posting spree here is out of mine and almost anyone else's scum range and would just be wildly anti-wincon if scum though because I'd be giving town more information to work with by spewing people as being unpartnered with me. I don't bother putting in a ton of work fake-solving if I know it's likely to all be rendered useless as soon as I flip red.


I don't think igorsprite is scum anymore, though, greeting - I think you have to get over your frustration him lying and acting in an antitown fashion, as i have, and kind of...try to look at overall play profile? like, just think back to day 1 and why you ere townreading him there, it probably still applies that he doesnt just egg on votes on him as mafia then claim PR (i also, again, think he doesn't openly state a PR read in-thread as mafia like he did a few pages back, he'd save it for the scum PT)

i mean i guess there's worlds where he fakes a red check and his partner yells at him to not do that and he gets forced to take it back, but meh. not worth thinking about, i think that's probably still pretty tinfoily

I'm with you on val but I think igorsprite is a red herring and you probably just need to to drop it

[catboi]

As much as I hate repeating myself on this, the last time someone ignored mechanics, in my Mini, (Mini 2235 - Gensokoyo) we lost because in ELO someone didn't realize that the only other town was mechanically cleared. As of right now, there are just zero reasons to make this Igor the elimination today and that's final.

I see your point but the only way he's ever going to be cleared is if he's real and we flip the mafia roleblocker toay which is not really a reliable thing at all

otherwise you have to evaluate him on the balance of his play

I've had games where people refuse to even consider an uncced PR claim as scum despite that PR acting in a very scummy way

So really, the challenge is to just forget about the claim and read igorsprite on his own terms (and as I said, I think on balance he's probably town here)


As I've been saying though, this suspicion from Greeting basically never ever comes from scum here, it just doesn't. Very, very few scum players knowingly try to push cases that are unpopular. You need to separate your feelins of disliking the case from whether or not it has scum motivation (sort of like how Greeting has to do the same for igorsprite's play)

[catboi]

Okay, so, with regard to MafMen, buckle up, it's going to be a bit long (don't have time to wait for implosion anymore, i've decided)

His scum games on this forum are all old, there's a 3-year playing gap like I said, but there was a fairly clear pattern in his scum games from prior to that break. For refrence, the games are:

Newbie 1869
Micro 813
Mini 2014

So, in all of these games, he exhibits a tendency toward overconfident TMI townreads on people, while generally lacking the ability or willingness to fake scumreads and make cases on people. Kind of a typical pattern amongst players who don't have much experience playing scum. Overall I would say his demeanor in those games is kind of meek, except for maybe some flashes of defensiveness when pushed, he was overall unwilling to pick fights with people and push on townies.

Now, in 3 years a lot can change, but playing scum is hard and I'd sort of expect him to be more rusty/out of touch from not having played n a while, rather than having hit a new level (having taken a long break myself, I felt significant rust in my first games when I was playing scum after that hiatus).


You could say that maybe he's exhibiting that tendency toward TMI townreads in his early posting in this game, with stuff like 49's "greeting is probtown", 52's read on pseudoaristotle, 61's "im not getting scumpings from anyone", and calling his wagon pure in 72. But, where it differs, I think is what comes after that.

(as an aside, I like the comment in 58 about trying to move the game forward, because again in his old games mafmen struck me as kind of a lazy scum player who'd be fairly content with a game being inactive as it would mean less pressure on him to post)

What mafmen does, attacking val for being "gross and disingenuous" in 142, is just wildly outside his established scumrange, val is a very verbose player who's a pain in the butt to argue with, most scum see that type of player and simply steer clear of them, but he doesn't do that, he continues to press at val, accusing him of misrepresenting greeting in 147, the whole explanation of what he's doing in 162 reads super genuine where he's explaining his goals and getting annoyed at val for overcomplicating things in their argument, I think town is more likely to have feelings like someoneis making things difficult, it's harder when you know the person you're arguing against is arguing sincerely. It's also a bit of an empathy read because I'm feeling how manipulative and disingenuous val is being in his arguments.

reaction to greeting threatenin to selfhammer in 210/211 feels believable too, the kind of thing that can be faked but i think in particular the disappointment and confusion in the second post where the person he was defending says something he thinks is antitown reads believable to me and he starts trying to lecture him to set him on the right path

The de-escalation in 261 I also believe, like he got an answer at that time that satisfied him, but then the continued incredulity in 269, I basically agreed entirely at the time with the reasoning here that Greeting's "VT slip" wasn't a meaningful scumtell of any sort

but I think the way he keeps trying to argue with/persuade val even after unvoting him is towny - for most mafia I think if they decide they're done pushing someone, they leave them alone, but him continuing to argue with Val in 288 and 296 (among other posts) shows a legitimate desire to try to persuade him to his view - most mafia don't bother with this, I don't think it's close to MafMen's range at all - I felt like him getting into that argument might have been a scum tactic at the start of the day but reading it over again, he's really trying to get his view across, not just argue for no reason

in 317 he clarifies he doesn't view Val as town, but I think even there the way he's arguing with val but not necessarily pushing him shows a solving intent

Even though it was wrong I don't really hate the obsrvation on Thyn in 318, I can see town having a problem with that post, I like that he's attacking something specific he fnds scummy rather than just vaguely calling thyn wolfy.

Even the re-eval on me in 333 makes sense, I guess, looks like he got pointed at me and actually reread my posts and found them lack -

this is notable, because, again, as I said, MafMen tended to be very overconfident in his TMI townreads in his old scum games, and rarely wavered on them

- here he re-evals on both Thyn and me when we're doing things he doesn't like, and he even waves on Greeting - he doesn't display an absolute certainty that Greeting is town, just that the reasoning he was being attacked for wasn't good.

I'm incredibly annoyed by him deciding in 446 my reaction to getting fake guiltied was bad, as I've already said, but regardless I

can

see town thinking that and reacting the way he did to it.

granted he's seemingly flinging stones at EVERYONE, like in 464 and 521, which COULD be scum keeping heir options open, but I feel like that's wildly out of line with his past scum meta - I'd be surprised if he went the opposite direction and went the route of blindly attacking almost everyone to make them look bad, I think it's more likely coming from a paranoid townie mindset. (this probably the one part of his ISO where I could see it being someone playing a good scumgame, I just have to trust that my meta-eval is correct)

And again, the whole sequence where he asks me about my old game in 526, followed with the unvote to give me "room to breathe" in 530, only to start doubting himself in 532 reads super organic, it's a sequence very few scum players think to fake - maybe they take their foot off the gas and say they're reconsidering me, but they do it all in the same post, it'd be constructed, it woudn't get out in bits and pieces as the gears are turning in his head

I think on overall play and comparisons with his past scumgames, MafMen is very likely town and shouldn't be voted out this game.

[catboi]

Like, Val's singlemindedness toward catboi right now is really offputting. Even igor, absolute closed box of reasoning that he has been, has admitted now that catboi's posting is giving him pause. Val seems absolutely convinced that every thing catboi posts is tainted. There is like, so little of substance that Val has posted today that isn't about why catboi is scum. I feel like if catboi is scum then they're playing an incredibly good game here, a game that deserves recognition in the sense that like, I don't understand how someone can be so unwaveringly confident that catboi is scum in the face of the past several pages. I can understand scumreading them in spite of that but I can't understand an

unwavering

scumread on them.

i think val's playstyle as either alignment is to hard aggressive tunnel and just resist all other outside voices, meta-wise I have basically no handle on it at all despite trying to dig on it for a bit earlier, I was going to try to show you he's capable of making ~reasonable sounding posts as mafia in his one completed scumgame so I don't think he's town for necessarily being able to, like, post well

and even then I was unsure other than his posting tilting me incredibly hard because I've had to deal with tunnelers before, I was really just waiting on you to come back to the game because I felt more confident I'd be able to sort you based on interacting with you

[catboi]

I also want to say right now: I think

frogsfrogs

has been

super

selective in the things they are choosing to post and respond to in-thread, generally relegating themselves to a very narrow band of arguments about igorsprite's claim and avoiding all the other stuff, and I think it's highly mafia-indicative, hat they just don't know how to make a rebuttal to what I'm putting out and so are just willfully ignoring it

[catboi]

The fact that they've softened on me without me doing anything at all to warrant that i guess could be in response to people not buying the push on me but it's also just like, idk, not how i'd be looking at the game as scum there.

FWIW it's a combiation of things, as I said it's got to do with thinking your responses to me screaming bloody murder that you were 100% scum were genuine, but even then I was unsure, basically my only belief here was that as scum you'd just continue to direct an agenda onto me where as town you're a good enough player you ought to be able to find me.

Which is kind of an annoying and cruddy way to be judged on reads because it's not like no one is ever wrong but I've been caught as scum before basically because someone called me out on reading them in a way I shouldn't have been and that was what I was trying to do with you here

[catboi]

IDK how you feel about frogsfrogs but I guess the one player I haven't really gone some length on is StrangeMatter, idk if you want to discuss that one, we can, since you've mentioned their slot being one you haven't given much consideration?

[catboi]

I think StrangeMatter mostly feels very earnest even if their stances aren't really clear, stuff trying to explain what they think is best to do, talking about how a past game was lost because of people ignoring mechanics seems like a believable concern

But, well, if I'm going full scorched earth here I might as well say I'm pretty certain pseudoaristotle effectively PR slipped on day 1 and that's basically colored my read of the slot ever since then. I might have wanted to still hide it but igorsprite said the same exact thing in-thread a while ago, so F it, might as well quit holding back on that read because otherwise I start to sound TMI-ish

[catboi]

(Strange, don't confirm or deny anything in response to that. I know me saying that at all is anti-town but I feel like I have to be completely transparent here)

[catboi]

I also want to say right now: I think

frogsfrogs

has been

super

selective in the things they are choosing to post and respond to in-thread, generally relegating themselves to a very narrow band of arguments about igorsprite's claim and avoiding all the other stuff, and I think it's highly mafia-indicative, hat they just don't know how to make a rebuttal to what I'm putting out and so are just willfully ignoring it

Yeah, I've admitted before already to sometimes reading through the thread, having my own reactions and taking stuff in, but then blanking on what to actually say. :/ Definitely a lot of what I've posted today has been related to the Igor case, but it's been about pursuing a thread on greeting that's been totally confusing me and I still think looks not town. I've realized so far that they're... firm in stating the belief and not active enough right now to hash it out. Fine. I keep reading through your big greeting analysis to try and digest it and I think it makes me waiver my read on you more than it does him.

Okay.
You realize that you only coming in to say this now, after implosion unvotes me and removes the momentum on me, makes it look like you're playing to an agenda? Like you're trying to just shift people's focus to a different wagon now that you can't get me flipped.

[catboi]

hot take, greeting v val was svs

I don't think that ever, ever happens in a 9p game

[catboi]

@MafMen:

I went deep on Greeting in 647 650 and 652, I'll give a look to what you have to say but I don't think he's scum here at all, please give it a look (I wrote stuff about you in 715 if you crave validation or want to know how I'm reading you right now)

Would much, much prefer if your vote was on Val over Greeting

[catboi]

VOTE: Val89

[catboi]

Okay.
You realize that you only coming in to say this now, after implosion unvotes me and removes the momentum on me, makes it look like you're playing to an agenda? Like you're trying to just shift people's focus to a different wagon now that you can't get me flipped.

I have not unvoted you, still scum read you, and have been actively questioning greeting before now. My focus has already been there and hasn't moved from you either. This was an attempt to try and be more forthcoming / generous with my thought process after you specifically pointed out that I've only felt confident in a few trains of thought recently. :/ It's true that I think the depth of your posting is a point for townieness, now that you're still in that mode multiple real days after you were initially voted.

Again, make whatever excuse you want. If you think I am scum, why do you act like you have something to prove when I make a point about how you're engaging with the thread? Why do you only mention being unsure and start posturing toward Greeting when the momentum on me dies down? Why are you scared to engage with any of my actual substance to even state why you disagree?

This is a pattern with you, and it's really incredibly scummy

[catboi]

I think you're scared scum who's been flying under the radar but is struggling to come up with anything to actually say

[catboi]

If you'd like to prove me wrong, then go ahead, give me some free associative thoughts, as best as you can, as to why you don't agree with my analysis of Greeting. Don't have to even respond to specific points of mine, just go off the top of your head.

[catboi]

This is the same thing I questioned you on qith your reads earlier - you'll make statements or put out opinions but there seems to be very little in the way of meaningful reasoning backing it up, and often you'll just copy things others are saying for your pushes

[catboi]

Again, what do you mean that I am posturing towards greeting now when much of my posting in the past day-- which you are the one to bring up at the top of this reply chain-- has been about questioning greeting (for his read on Igor)!!
I KNOW I am not great at scumhunting yet. I'm town and I am trying my best to engage. I do not think the way you're characterizing this post is true to reality and need to say so.

I mean your entire movement feels like it's a momentum shift toward a scum agenda because with implo expressing doubt you need to move onto a new target so are faking doubt on me but won't address my actual substance on greeting because you need to get a mis-elim to win

It's the kind of thing that comes where you want to seem like you're taking people's thoughts into consideration, but you're not, you're playing toward a goal and you know you have to target certain people so ultimately you have to ignore what's actually being said and maybe shrug it off with a "sorry gosh i'm just not convinced :/"

That is what I mean by playing to an agenda, you avoid actually addressing anything that's inconvenient to you

[catboi]

Absolutely not let’s not put Catboi at E-1.

I think this post is the best case for Strange being maybe town. Scum would want to talk it out for a bit and then hammer, really, right?

I have almost no clue what you're even trying to say with the second part of this post. Though, I don't really have a really good read on Implosion or MafMen at this point.

You could read my analysis on MafMen in 715?

(Explaining implo would be a lot harder, it boils down to a veteran experience type of thing)

[catboi]

The emotional appeal element of "I'm trying my best" in frogsfrogs's response to me is a very typical response of newb-scum when confronted, it's an evasive maneuver

There's a bit of a hint of how DaTacoX reacted to me questioning him in my last game although I wasn't nearly as aggressive in that game, the response was a similar "I know I've been underwhelming", newb-scum are self-conscious about not being able to to hit the same level of analysis that town does, but since they can't compensate for it they try to cover it up with apologetics and making people feel bad for them

[catboi]

I mean okay, but with your recent string of comments, you're trying way too hard to get buddy buddy with me I think.

Strange, I need to find the people I believe are town and convince them to vote the people I think are scum. That is part of the town win condition. It is the most basic element of how the game is played.


I'm not sure what you expect me to do otherwise here? If I believe you are town, and I need to convince you, do I just make generalized statements to the entire thread, like I'm giving a speech, and hope people actually read it and pay attention to it?


It's not just you I've been talking to, I've been talking to almost everyone on an individual level to try to discuss with them.

On a basic level,

yes

, I

AM

trying to get on your good side!

I am trying to convince you of my view of the game

. That is a basic fact of how this game is played.

Of course, the mafia are going to try to convince you, too. That is another fact of the game. It is your job to decide whether the person trying to convince you is doing so because they are a part of the mafia team.

But someone trying to convince you does not mean they are scum.

[catboi]

(Super towny thing for Strange to say, though)

[catboi]

The best part is, Strange, you don't even have to trust me today: if you decide I am a member of the mafia team, I encourage you to go ahead and vote me out. You will be unfortunately wrong, but you will know I am confirmed town in that case, and know that all my analysis was coming from a genuine place, and I want it to be followed.

[catboi]

The things I'm read from your greeting posts, catboi, are that 1. His early reads were weak, even for the beginning of day 1, but 2. His real seeming emotionality and 3. Sometimes implausible theories look like town and not scum behavior respectively.

There's significant points I've made beyond that and this is a serious glossing over on your part

It's not just the emotionality which can be faked but the specific act of threatening to self-hammer and sacrifice because of his confidence in his scumread, that act from a newbie comes from town far, far more often than not and that's something I can say because I've played in and read a fair number of games

There is also the fact that the

type

of reads he is making are ones newb-scum just doesn't make, the information he's using, the fact that he called you out for lurking because he noticed your activity indicates a town solving mindset where he's trying to find any piece of information

like you're just trying to boil down what I say to the most reductive interpretation possible, it's super uncharitable

[catboi]

You wrote a whole bunch of words on how all of Greeting's play

could

be coming from scum but didn't actually explain why it is more likely to be coming from scum than town

this is what scum does, it's scummy because there is no solving process behind it, you're not actually evaluating greeting, you don't care about anything I'm saying, you're not trying to weigh possibilities you're simply pushing Greeting because you say his actions

could

be coming from scum, and anyone can make an argument about why someone

could

be scum

[catboi]

I am shredding your reasoning in plain view for everyone to see because you are ridiculously scummy and it is my goal to make that as clear as possible. It's not hard.

[catboi]

I think 430 and 582 are scummy. "Only the other PR knows what's true or not"???

Why's that supposed to be scummy? From an uninformed perspective, Greeting as a VT wouldn't know what the other PR is and they would be the one that would have more information on if igorsprite is telling the truth or not

Arguing that Igor's alleging mechanically impossible situations when he isn't?

Okay, why does scum do that? Isn't it more likely that Greeting just straight-up misunderstood what igorpsrite was saying? I don't think, even in a world where he

is

scum, Greeting tries to outright lie that igorsprite is alleging mechanically impossible situations, no one believes they can twist the truth that much. Far more likely he just thought igorsprite was actually saying that stuff. Which doesn't make him town from it but it's not really a scumtell at all.

I think having changed his Igor read overnight is scummy

Why is changing a read overnight scummy? Are you saying town can't have the capacity to re-evaluate and change their mind? That's absolutely outrageous. Being triggered by igorsprite changing his night action claim around repeatedly is a perfectly reasonable explanation for him flipping his read.

If you were trying to argue the read change was opportunistic, that might make sense. But...igorsprite is very obviously not a viable wagon, so why on earth is that read change

actually scummy?

, you leave that part vague, you keep pointing at things and calling them scummy but not actually indicating why any of it comes from being mafia-aligned

that his weak read on you, and weak reads in general, is a bad sign at this stage.

Why is that actually scummy? Town are often uncertain and confused because they are uninformed, and weak reads and uncertainty are a natural state to be in especially as the game drags on and arguments become confusing. With effectively no clears from his POV I would expect Greeting to have weak reads as town read now. The only reason I have strong reads is because I have been under pressure for almost the entire day, which has galvanized my view of the game, and because I have devoted nearly every waking hour to reading this game and trying to solve it, which has led me from my early state in the day of uncertain flailing panic to a confident solve

You yourself have said things about how you're not sure of yourself but somehow Greeting's uncertainty is a scumtell here? That doesn't add up logically.

My read on him deteriorated through the end of day one as he stuck so hard to the Val argument and makes gestures like 279: "Well, if no one is convinced by each other, then the game is lost!"

Why is sticking to an argument and making gestures about the game being lost a scumtell? You're doing this again, you just point at things and call them bad but can't actually explain

why

it's scummy. Town can get stuck in an argument they're convinced of, and can get overblown and overdramatic

I actually do not think the self hammer declaration is nessecarily town AI

Both implo and I are speaking from experience in saying that the self-hammer declaration is town more often than not, we can't both be scum lying about this to defend a partner.

The counterargument you have made against this is "nuh uh". Which seems a lot like you just have a willful desire to call Greeting scummy for it. Which would come from playing to an agenda.

you've even noted as meta reads that greeting hasn't gotten as upset being voted as town, previously.

Okay, so what? I already assessed reasons that might be different this game.

Without a comparable meta-model of what Greeting-scum looks like and how he reacts to pressure, I can only observe that he is responding

differently

, not that he is responding

scummily

, because games and circumstances change. It is entirely possible for him to still be town this game and be reacting in a more dramatic fashion because he feels differently about the game and his place in the gamestate.

[catboi]

All of this is just really, really, really bad, it's reach beyond reach, and frogsfrogs at no point actually tries to infer scum motivation in anything he's saying is scummy from Greeting. They just describe things Greeting has done and says they are scummy, no followup as to

why

in any of it. It's a classic newbie-scum case.

[catboi]

Shrug, that feels like a bluff from Val although I'm super biased

[catboi]

Someone might try to compare that to my read on Greeting but I think context is king

[catboi]

Prior to the recent activity I had planned on trying to analyze the interactions between frogsfrogs and val to see if they were compatible, because I want to put out everything I can into the thread and see if team makes sense, I think there's stuff there

I know I was warning against pre-flip associatives because it made me do dumb things on day 1 but I have strong scumreads on both of them due to individually scummy behavior and POE, this would be a last step of "does this solve make sense?"

[catboi]

VOTE: Val89

Which one of you scumbags are going to hammer me then, eh, or are both of you already on this wagon?

Yeah, okay, this post is super off and I'll explain why:

Val churns out these massive walls on the regular in his posting, trying to gin up arguments with everyone, even when someone is trying to break it off and makes it clear they don't see a point in arguing with him


Then, suddenly, when the tide turns against him, he just immediately says nothing else, no arguing with his supposed townread, no attempts to leave behind a legacy?

it's not a believable display at all

[catboi]

The whole purpose there is just intimidation to try to scare people off

[catboi]

he was super-confident in having the solve of me/greeting earlier but suddenly he's talking about "flushing out the partner"

he wants to scare people into not voting him by making them afraid they'll get scumread for doing so

[catboi]

mmmmkay

[catboi]

I'm seeing Val doing this as a way to force opinions of greeting (see who thinks this self vote is still scummy vs thinking greeting self hammer threat town & why) and see if there's a hammer after his two scum reads are already voting him. He's town. He doesn't do this right now, making himself actually in danger of a lim, unlike greeting, if he's about to flip red and I think this kind of extreme play is in line with who he's been so far!!

VOTE: Greeting
It's two of greeting / catboi / mafmen, and this train makes it look a lot like the first two :I

I do how you're writing this as an explanation

for

Val, like you're his lawyer or something.

[catboi]

he wants to scare people into not voting him by making them afraid they'll get scumread for doing so

Catboi, who is it you think this applies to, here, from your perspective?

igor/mafmen/strange/implo, that's the audience you're trying to make not want to vote you here.

The act is transparent, IMO. frogs coming undone with desperation on the last page and trying to cover for you reinforces that.

[catboi]

Val absolutely should start explaining himself here, but yeah, sure, me reading the situation is clearly a scumtell. Do you agree with igor that I'm only town if I vote him?? How does this being a bluff by scum!val work?

No, I think you're scum regardless, because your posts are incredibly scummy and the way you have been arguing with me does not feel like town thought process. I believe you and Val have tied yourselves at the hip and you know him flipping is going to be damning for you, as I have been arguing (and was going to make a post about).

It being a bluff is very simple, he selfvotes, people panic and ask themselves if scum would give up like that, maybe they second-guess themselves out of it.

I think contextually it's a significantly different move from what Greeting was doing on day 1. There's no feeling behind it, no no genuine frustration, it's totally out of line with Val's personality and how he'd been posting all game prior to this

[catboi]

Except that implo was already on my wagon, and you've told us that Igor/SM are the PRs from your perspective, no?

Your pedantry is incredibly tedious. You say that stuff, but no one is theoretically cleared, a jailkeeper claim could be CC'd, etc, and there's a lot of psychology behind it, people don't want to get called scum for voting you

I don't think you're going down with the bravado of believing your flip will vindicate your reads.

[catboi]

You seem to be floundering around quite a bit trying to explain something that's so "transparent", catboi.

Come on. Explain. If Igor and SM are the PRs from your perspective, why do they worry about getting scumread for having voted me?

Kiss my tail val, the game isn't about you trying to win precise arguments on my wording like you're in a debate club


Jokes about "self-vote and AtE" are well-worn in mafia by now, it's hardly anything new.

Your selfvote does not look genuine.

[catboi]

If you're so utterly confident, just leave a legacy case that'll sink me, rather than this tedious crap over word choice.

I am fully prepared to be voted and lose this game should you flip town (because you'll have made it unwinnable)

Likewise, if people were to panic and vote Greeting and he flipped scum, I would take it squarely on the chin that my read was awful and accept elimination.

[catboi]

What I see is someone who's running on fumes