Newbie 982 - Shadows of Death, Game Over!

[MichelSableheart]

I have read my rules, I have read my role pm, I don't have any questions.

In other words: /confirm.

A note on the term Random Voting Stage: In the beginning of the game, our goal should be to get discussion started. Actions that don't help with that are not helpful for the town. There is no such thing as a stage in the game where it is ok to behave randomly.

Personally, I would prefer if we didn't random vote at all. Votes in the beginning of the game are intended to start discussion, but a vote is much more likely to start discussion if there is an actual idea behind it.

As far as I am concerned, there was no reason to wait for everyone to confirm before starting actual discussion. All discussion we get done before the game has officially begun is discussion we don't have to go through during the actual game. It gives us more time to decide on a lynch. @Aurorus: why did you want to wait? Were you perhaps hoping that town didn't get discussion going at all?

@Akira: May I ask why you believe Zauper is more likely scum? Reasons such as "he's all piraty" are (unfortunately) seen pretty often early in the game, and are in my experience equally likely to come from town as from scum. At least Zauper made an attempt to get discussion started, unlike Valkyrie, who also made a post before yours.

@Zauper, LoakaMossi: is it possible for you to get an avatar? It helps us if we can easily recognize your posts.

[MichelSableheart]

I have no problem with starting the game by voting players in order to draw a reaction. However, a random vote is very unlikely to actually get a reaction. It is, in my opinion, far better to make an actual argument for why someone is scum, no matter how weak that argument may be.

My argument that Aurorus was trying to stifle discussion completely was not joking. It was a rather strong accusation given the information available, but it was a possible explanation for his behaviour. In fact, it's an explanation I still believe possible.

In my opinion, there's nothing rude about starting the game before everyone has confirmed, especially when the mod leaves the thread open. In fact, I have quite often seen mods officially start the game before the last couple of players have confirmed. Furthermore, if the mod is searching for a replacement, we also don't go twiddle our thumbs. Not everyone needs to be present to play.

Why did you "scold" Aurorus if Valkyrie_Hrist was the first one to suggest waiting?

I read Valkyrie's post more as surprise that discussion was already starting, rather then the demand to stop discussion. In fact, her question "shouldn't we wait?" encourages other players to answer, thereby encouraging discussion. Aurorus, on the other hand, flat out stated that he wouldn't discuss till everyone had confirmed. He was guilty of stifling discussion, Valkyrie was not.

Regarding lurking: I personally make a difference between active lurking (posting enough to not be replaced, while posting little to no content) and inactivity (a failure to post at all, likely to lead to replacement). The usage of the term "lurking" for what essentially is inactivity creates needless confusion. In my experience, town players and scumplayers alike can become inactive, but there is slightly more incentive for scum to active lurk then there is for town.

I have a question for veterans: when people decide to RVS, do they only release their random vote at the end of the phase or do they directly accuse them during discussion?

The RVS is only a term used to describe what usually happens. It is not an actual stage of the game. What you usually see is that player immediately vote, and those votes are moved till they slightly become more serious. In fact, it's rather unique that noone has voted yet.

I'm slightly annoyed at players who say Random Voting is bad, but who also don't make any accussations. Can we actually start discussing who is mafia, please? Especially Valkyrie and Loaka seem to be guilty of this.

Aurorus is worse though. Not only did he stifle discussion by flat out stating that he wouldn't discuss during confirmations, he also intentionally steered the discussion towards theory discussion with his questions about experience and lurking.

Vote: AurorusVox

[MichelSableheart]

More of an admin question: so that I don't have to keep finding this in the forum should I click 'subscribe topic' or 'bookmark topic'? x

If you want to have easy access to this topic, you should click 'bookmark topic', which places the topic in a list of favourites which can be accessed through the user control panel. 'subscribe topic' sends an email to you every time someone posts in the topic.

@Guybrush: I'll probably be breaking your rule about not interfering from time to time, especially when a question is worded accusingly. Especially later in the game, the defense of the accused isn't nearly as important as the opinions of other players. After all, the accused won't be the one deciding to lynch him.

@BAZZ: being mafia will alter the way you look at a game, and may therefore cause a subtle shift in writing style. To spot this difference, you ideally need to compare the writing style of a player in this game with his writing style in different games where you know his alignement. I have to admit though that my grasp of the english language isn't good enough to spot such subtle differences.

[MichelSableheart]

#50 and #53 by Aurorus are pretty good scumhunting. Appearantly, he wasn't trying to stifle discussion after all.

Unvote

Valkyrie, I have two questions for you:

1. Is english your native language?
   
2. Why were you so concerned about my vote for Aurorus? I voted Aurorus in post #30. Aurorus first post after that was #50. I didn't post since then. Why did you feel the need to state in post #64 that I should retract my vote?

Why is it that you don't think I'm asking questions to scum-hunt? You of all people should know this.

Can you please explain what you meant here? I'm especially having significant trouble why Aurorus is being adressed with "you of all people". What exactly is "this" that Aurorus should know, and why should he know it better then someone else? Also, can you please explain why Aurorus vote for you is more likely to come from scum then from town? Same question for your FoS on zauper.

[SNIP Michel = scum assumption]
He notices something considered fishy (stifling discussion).
He accuses you, but not Valk.
Why? Because he's not searching for objectivity, he's searching for anything so he could say he did his share of scumhunting.

When you have double standards - that could mean that you're not that committed and haven't put that much thought into it.
So that's another option I'm considering, which Valk obviously is not.

It may be relevant to mention here that early in the game I look for anything that can be turned into an accusation. As I said before, I prefer to get discussion started with actual accusations, but early in the game those are difficult to come by because there isn't much to go on. The result is that I'll usually make a pretty weak accusation to which I'm not very commited, and in which I haven't put a great deal of thought. The part I quoted looks like it's describing my town play pretty well.

[MichelSableheart]

3) Re-read post 94. I clearly give the reason on why zauper is on my FoS list along with AV

It was definately not clear that you were scumhunting. It felt to me that you were defending against Aurorus attack, rather then actually trying to determine the alignement of Aurorus. Because of this, I find it far more likely that zauper has suspicions of you then that he is trying to cover up for Aurorus.

You also haven't given me a good reason for your suspicions of Aurorus. As far as I can determine, you believe he is scum because he is voting you?

Also, Michel, you clearly haven't posted as much as the others here. Is there a reason to why you've been lurking in this game?

The accusation of lurking is ridiculous. If you look at the posts I made, you'll find that I have posted plenty of content. I really don't believe you can accuse me of trying to avoid giving opinions in order to stay under the radar.

The accusation of me not being very active makes more sense. I posted on monday morning and tuesday evening, and didn't visit the site in the meantime. Posting once a day is the standard on this site, which I did. I haven't been more active then that due to my personal schedule, which is none of your business.

[MichelSableheart]

@Guybrush: The accusation is strong in the sense that it uses stronger language and is more serious then would be justified by the facts. The accusation is weak in the sense that it is not very convincing because it isn't justified by the facts. Apologies for the confusing language.

@2003: the number of active posts has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not someone is active lurking, and inactivity is not a scumtell.

[MichelSableheart]

@Michel: I never said that inactivity OR lurking was a scum-tell, so I don't know what forced you to say that.

If the question about my activity wasn't intended to find out if I was intentionally avoiding posting, what was it's point? And why would you want to find out if someone is intentionally avoiding posting, except because you believe scum is more likely to avoid posting then town is? And isn't that last part the exact definition of a scumtell?

2003 is playing far too defensively for my liking, Her votes seem far too closely related to the players who vote her, without taking their likely intentions into account. She is definately among my top suspects at the moment.

Loaka didn't post at all in the past couple of days. I believe it's far more likely he is simply inactive rather then that he's lurking.

Mod: Prod Loaka please

Finally, I have a request to make, although I'm guilty of breaking this request myself quite often. Is it possible for everyone to keep their posts concise? Even if a post isn't a wall of text, it can still be a bit too much information to take in for other players.

[MichelSableheart]

Vote: Valkyrie

Sure, rereading can take a while, but it won't take you 12 hours. If you're not going to do a reread today, at least given an estimation on when your reread will be done.

Furthermore, I'm still waiting on an answer to the questions I asked in post #98, and want to put on a bit of pressure to make sure they aren't forgotten.

---

How awfully convenient that someone else gave 2003 a good reason to keep his vote on Zauper when the original "defending Aurorus" reason was no longer maintainable.

---

Rereading Zauper in isolation, I'm not at all convinced by the argument that Zauper is agreeing with others more then would be natural. The way I see it, Aurorus gives his argument for 2003 being scum, and Zauper listens, goes to check if it's correct, then votes.

What I particulary don't like about the case against Zauper is the way BAZZ draws a number of quotes out of context in post #120 (the one where he tries to show that Zauper agrees with others more then normal). The result is that he manages to let people get a general impression of Zauper which is extremely difficult to verify.

[MichelSableheart]

Apologies for this being long. Lots of different points to reply to.

@Michel: Is your vote based on nothing more than your deep need of an answer to your questions? Was that what you meant by "pressure"?

That is what I meant by pressure, yes, allthough the belief that Valkyrie might be lurking intentionally and a gut read of scum also played a role.

@Michel; I think that to say that "someone" has given 2k3 a reason to keep his vote on Zauper now that his original reason has faded is a little bit of a misrepresentation. ooBazzoo had built the beginnings of his case before 2k3 revealed why he had voted for Zauper. Unless you're suggesting that the "someone" is me?

You're putting the emphasis wrong. I was trying to focus on the fact that 2003 used an existing case to keep his vote when the original reason for that vote was gone. It didn't really matter who brought up that case in the first place. I don't believe anyone brought up the case on Zauper with the goal of allowing 2003 to keep his vote.

[SNIP]However, as I pointed out in my last post, [Zaupers] questions have been rephrasings of other peoples' concerns. Do you think that this is more valuable than asking his own questions?

I haven't had the time to check this accusation yet, so I can't say to what extend this is true. I'll look into it. Obviously, copying questions is not as valuable as bringing up your own questions, but simultaneously, copying questions is contributing to the game, because your general opinions can be determined from which questions you copy.

You've voted Valk for taking too long to re-read. What about LoakaMossi, who has admitted that he has been reading the thread but not posting? It has taken him nearly 72 hours to read the thread, between his posts, and has only been prompted to post because of either a) the prod, or b) my vote, or c) a combination of these.

It is possible that Loaka is intentionally lurking. However, a lot of players jumped on him to tell him how he should contribute. If he was speaking the truth about not knowing what to do, we'll see an improvement soon enough, and if he was lurking, we'll notice soon enough too.

Valkyrie on the other hand promised content to be coming. From the way she worded her post #147, I understood that she was in the proces of rereading when she wrote it. I would have expected her to state something along the lines of "sorry, didn't have time to finish my reread, content will come at [specific time]" when she stopped rereading. The post she made left it completely open when that content would come, however. If Valkyrie is intentionally lurking, it would be much more difficult to determine. Because of this, I decided to pressure her, but not Loaka.

@Michel: Why did you go after Valk after only 12 hours? It's not really that long, in the grand scheme of things. Particularly when we have folks that aren't posting / haven't contributed thus far.

As said above, I was under the impression that she started rereading when she made #147, and would have expected her to either give results on at least the first couple of posts she read, or give an estimation of when we could expect such posts. The way she worded it left it completely open, potentially even allowing her to get prodded again and come in with "sorry, was busy rereading".

@ Michel – From your post (#156) I got the impression that you don’t see my vote for Zauper as justified. If you disagree with my reasons then that’s fair enough, but (being a more experienced player) I’m interested to know how you read Zauper?
Also, do you think your reasons for voting Valk were more justified than my reasons for voting Zauper?

I think your vote is justified, but don't agree with your read. I'm having a slight town read on zauper because I understand why he's been questioning who he's been questioning, and because of the way he is being attacked at the moment (the attack by 2003 especially feels as either scum going for an easy target, or town being steered by scum to vote for who they want).

[MichelSableheart]

@Guybrush: I don't think you have to worry about me following your reasons for voting Valkyrie later. There's a reason I want my questions in post #98 answered. I'm seeing a potential Valkyrie-Aurorus scumpairing, because of her strong reaction to my vote for Aurorus, and the way Aurorus defended her at the top of page 4 when he didn't really defend anyone else.

[MichelSableheart]

@Michel and Aurorus (as experienced players)
What are your thoughts on this:

Has anyone seen Valk lately? Seems that Valk is being quiet.

Do you think it would be fair if someone were now to reply "I saw her online yesterday, but she still didn't respond. Lurking probably."
And how would you treat that argument? Would you accept it or not?

I would consider it poor form if someone used that argument. It's easy for a player to hide his or her online status. If someone doesn't hide his or her online status, that's a service to the other forum members that I'm reluctant to take advantage of.

I might accept it as a valid argument if that player is only involved in this game. If it is a regular MD/GD poster, or if they're also playing mishmash, or other forum games, the fact that someone is online and posting doesn't necessary mean that they have the time to look into this game. I know that I give priority to the games I'm modding when I'm pressed for time.

---

I've said this before: Loaka feels more inactive then lurking to me. And inactivity is in my experience a null-tell, even though it's mightily annoying.

But I take issue with your reasoning; Valkyrie only reacted to your vote for me after Guybrush had pointed it out. I think you might be referring to the point at which she said "I think Michel should take his vote off" (or something similar) which I definitely found odd, but again, that was only after Guybrush had said he was satisfied with my explanation.

I questioned Valkyrie about it first, because I wanted to hear her explanation. That question was made in post #98, and still isn't answered. The fact that you are now (partially) answering for her doesn't really make me happy. I only mentioned the topic because Guybrush accused me of setting up a follow of his reasoning.

I'll get into this topic more when Valkyrie has actually answered my question. I'm not willing to press an Aurorus case over it without seeing a Valkyrie flip first anyway.

[MichelSableheart]

A full day passing with only 3 posts? That's disappointing.

Mod:

can we get prods on Loaka and Valkyrie, please?

[MichelSableheart]

You're missing a very important option, 2003: trying to get a lynch organized on someone we are suspicious of.

I'm currently willing to support a lynch of Valkyrie. Although her latest batch of non-posting suggests inactivity, there are some rather scummy remarks in her posts. Her comment on my Aurorus vote is one of them. Her decission to answer Guybrush first despite my explicit request to answer my questions ASAP is another. Her tendency in the first couple of posts to discuss how random voting was bad without doing anything to actually move the game forward was a third.

I am NOT willing to support a zauper lynch. There are better cases out there then the case against him, and in my memorie, some players were joining his bandwagon far too opportunistically.

I am NOT willing to support a Loaka/Omnino lynch, except when needed to guarantee a lynch at deadline. Loaka seems to me to be a typical new player who signs up enthousiastically, then loses interest. I see no indication of alignement in his disappearance.

I'm willing to support a lynch of 2003. No matter how often I read his early posts, I simply fail to see an indication of scumhunting in them. The only thing I see is a tendency to attack anyone who attacks him, and unvoting as soon as they remove their vote. Also, the way he started supporting BAZZ's case against Zauper doesn't sit well with me.

I'm willing to support a lynch of Akira, though I don't want to push it at this moment. Something feels a bit of with the way how he leaves his vote on Zauper when he goes on V/LA.

I see no reasons to go after Aurorus, Guybrush or BAZZ at this point in time.

[MichelSableheart]

@ Michel – You have stated the people who you are prepared to lynch. Is this merely you letting the town know where your thoughts are, or are you saying this because you want action to be taken soon?

I don't think action needs to be taken immediately, but I would like to see discussion focus on who we want to lynch. It's better to decide on a lynch through discussion then through a last minute deadline scramble.

Also, a noob question - I’m not quite sure what you mean by:

I am NOT willing to support a Loaka/Omnino lynch, except when needed to guarantee a lynch at deadline

According to rule number 3, a No Lynch will occur if no majority is reached at the end of a day.

A No Lynch is bad for town in most cases, especially on day 1 of a newbie game. Assuming mafia kills each night (which they are likely to do), we can afford 2 mislynches before we have to lynch correctly or lose (Lylo) (2 lynches, 2 kills, means 5 players alive, among whom 2 mafia members). However, if we No lynch, mafia kills someone at night, and we only can afford 1 mislynch (kill, lynch, kill gives six players alive. a mislynch and another kill would mean 4 players alive with 2 mafia members, in which case the mafia can control the town lynch). A no lynch would effectively cost us a lynch, which is bad.

Because of this, I am willing to vote Omnino near deadline if that would mean we get a majority when there won't be a majority otherwise.

[MichelSableheart]

Appearantly, Valkyrie won't be answering then I still would like to hear what Seth believes is the reason for her concern about my vote for Aurorus, but can't expect a complete answer.

So to get back to the discussion I cut of in #202 - #207 because we were still waiting for an answer from Valkyrie then.

When I mentioned Valkyrie's strong reaction to my vote of Aurorus, I was referring to Post #64, in particular the remark that I should retract my vote. Allthough it is true that her remark came after discussion with Guybrush over my opinions and explanations, there was absolutely no reason for her to ask me to unvote. Aurorus didn't have a lot of votes on him so he wasn't in danger of being lynched. I hadn't posted since Aurorus reply to my post #30, so I hadn't had an opportunity to unvote yet. Guybrush didn't explicitly ask Valkyrie for opinions on my vote, only on my explanation. My vote for Aurorus didn't involve her in any way. Without reason to actually mention my vote, the statement that it should be retracted strikes me as overly concerned for a different player.

[MichelSableheart]

Mod:

Why wasn't Guybrush' vote for Seth in #275 counted?

@BAZZ, regarding my Akira suspicions in #222: I can't really put my finger on why I suspect Akira. My suspicions on him aren't very strong. It's mainly a general feeling of discomfort with his actions, in particular the way he voted Zauper when going V/LA.

I have to agree with Guybrush on Seth's #271. It's going after an easy target on weak, mostly copied reasoning. If I look at his comments on literally every post he quoted, I find myself disagreeing to the point that I'm surprised how you can even draw that conclusion from that post.

@Seth: you're missing a very important part of Guybrush' vote for you. As he stated, his vote was based for 80% on Valkyrie's actions. Allthough you may not be able to explain her actions, the two of you do share the same role, so her actions are indicative of your alignement.

A further remark: if you are town, please don't selfvote. Even if it turns out you are very likely to be mislynched, we will get far more information from your lynch if you allow someone else to place the hammer.

@BAZZ, regarding my defense of Zauper: One of the main reasons I believe him to be town, is that if I look at the players who claim to be suspicious of him, and if I look at when and how they declared that suspicion, it seems to me that far too many players are attacking him opportunistically on weak reasons, following the rest of the town. This herd mentality is in my experience almost always the result of scum pushing for an easy mislynch.

[MichelSableheart]

Seems like you're more afraid that scum is pushing for the easy lynch as opposed to considering that zauper might actually be scum. Do a reread on him and tell me what you think.

It is not fear that scum is pushing for the easy mislynch. It is a strong belief that scum is pushing for the mislynch. Judging from the behaviour of the other players, I conclude that zauper is town. There's no need for a reread. Besides, my opinion based on zaupers posts has already been given.

@Aurorus: Given his reaction, I believe Seth's "I may as well self vote" was an exaggeration (sp?) to illustrate how impossible he believes defending against accusations against Valkyrie is for him. What he intends to say is "if more players vote me for suspicions they have of Valkyrie, there's nothing I can do to safe myself". His mentioning selfvoting seems an example of something that wouldn't safe him, not as something he intends to do. In exactly the same way, he could have said "I may as well claim jester". The important part of the sentence is "may as well" which is completely different from "will".

I have to agree with you though that his reaction was a bit over the top given the relatively low amount of pressure he was under at the time.

Well, first off - do you think L-2 was getting him out from under the wood work? Nah? I agree.

This quote implies that you believe zauper will come back when he sees he's at L-1. Although the mod hadn't given information about prods at the time, zauper's last post in the thread was made almost a week ago. I can see no indication whatsoever that he'll come back because of your L-1 vote. If anything is going to work, it has to be a prod, but most likely he'll simply be replaced.

@Experienced players: is giving up more sign of townie or scum, and is it usually accompanied by a roleclaim?

In my experience, inactivity is rarely a sign of giving up. Players get replaced on this site often for a variety of reasons, to the extend that someone having to be replaced does not give any relevant information of their alignement.

[MichelSableheart]

@Omnino: The problem with pressuring someone who is inactive is that you aren't doing anything useful. Your pressure vote was extremely unlikely to have any effect. Pressuring an inactive feels more like placing your vote on a safe spot rather then actual scumhunting.

[MichelSableheart]

Had someone taken the bait, as you call it, we would almost certainly have had a dead pro-town player, without any direct indication that the player placing the hammer was scum. I've seen inattentive pro-town players place the hammer accidentally way too often for that strategy to work.

[MichelSableheart]

Still here, don't have the time to read though. Expect content tonight or tomorrow.

[MichelSableheart]

In this post, I'm replying to Omnino. In my next post, I'll be replying to other players. I probably also be looking at everyone again. Those posts won't be coming today though. I've spent several hours on this one already.

This is going to be an extremely long post. My apologies for that. I have separated long arguments by hr tags. Above the first HR tag is my general reply to Omnino. Between the first and the second HR tag is a further explanation of my townread on Zauper. After the second HR tag, I'm discussing Omnino's accusations in detail. That last part can easily be ignored by everyone else.


Regarding Omnino #329:

1. Was that wall of text really necessary? It feels like you are wasting my time, not only reading this, but also having to reply in detail.
   
2. Why do you believe that scum is more likely to post self-contradictions then town is? If you're arguing I'm scum for contradicting myself, that's something that should be in your post.
   
3. Regarding me handing a towncard to Zauper: see my reply to post #318, later in this post.
   
4. Have you tried to actually understand what I'm saying? Most of the "contradictions" you found simply come from you missing the point of my posts. I'll expend on this later in this post.
   
5. Have you looked at the context of my posts? Surely you have noticed that there are almost 2 full pages between my ISO #3 and #5?
   
6. Since I voted in ISO #7, and didn't unvote afterwards, my vote was on Valkyrie. This makes your comments that I don't vote in ISO #9 and ISO #12 rather pointless.
   
7. I can't claim to understand Zauper's posts better then anyone else, but I can give my opinion on what I'm seeing.
   
8. Regarding reading Zauper's ISO: I read his ISO to check the argument that Zauper agreed with others more then usual. I paid particular attention to the sections of his ISO that were relevant for that argument, and skimmed over the rest.
   
9. If you feel Seth's "I may as well self vote" was a throwaway comment to chase people of, feel free to be suspicious of him for it. I don't read his post that way, but have enough other reasons to be suspicious of that slot.

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Regarding my townread on Zauper. This is a response to your post #318. It is also relevant for your comments on my ISO #16.

First, a comment on the strenght of my reread. I believe Zauper to be pro-town. This does not mean that I won't look at that slot for the rest of the game, but it does mean that it will require very strong arguments to change my mind.

Identifying players as pro-town and acting on that read is an extremely productive way of scumhunting, because it helps you find the scum through a proces of elimination, and helps avoid mislynches.

You are hugely underestimating the amount of information that can be gained from looking at other players opinions of someone, even on day 1. I have said this before, and I'll say this again: the case against zauper didn't convince me, but my townread on Zauper is the result of the way other players acted towards him, not of anything HE posted. Just take a look at the bandwagon against him:

• 2003 was the first player to attack Zauper, FoSing and later voting him for what seemed to be OMGUS reasons. He later followed BAZZ' reasons to keep his vote on Zauper. This is unlikely to come from a scumbuddy of Zauper, because there wasn't enough pressure around to warrant bussing. OTOH, if 2003 is scum with someone else, Zauper is a relatively safe place for his vote.
  
• ooBAZZoo was the first player to post the case of agreeing too much against Zauper. This makes it unlikely that the two of them are scumbuddies, IMO. Zauper wasn't under significant pressure, nor was he playing badly, so there was no reason whatsoever for BAZZ to start a case against Zauper if they're scumbuddies.
  
• Aurorus added to the pressure in post #153. This post to me seems like it could be potentially distancing. It's adding to a case that already has some momentum, without the pressure having any immediate consequences. The pressure he places is a bit strong for distancing, especially later on, and I haven't seen too much reason to be suspicious of Aurorus, so this isn't a likely scenario.
  
• Akira doesn't comment on Zauper for quite a while, and when he does in post #183, he isn't very convincing. He's basically following the reasoning of everyone else, and only does so when he's asked directly. Based on this weak reasoning, he votes Zauper in #188, when he announces V/LA. It is possible that this is scumbuddies distancing. However, if Akira is scum, it's far more likely that he places this vote in the hope of being part of an easy lynch without being questioned on it too much (he explicitly asks everyone not to ask him questions till he is back, perhaps hoping his vote is forgotten?).
  
• Omnino places a FoS on zauper when the majority's suspicion is on him, despite Guybrush and me defending zauper. Later on, he puts him at L-1 when zauper is likely to be replaced. If Omnino was zauper's scumbuddy, he would likely have agreed with Guybrush and me as more experienced players and defended zauper. Furthermore, he would have used zaupers inactivity as a reason to not place his vote there. OTOH, if Omnino is scum and zauper isn't, the L-1 vote works very well as an attempt to get a mislynch which can be blamed on someone else, and even if that doesn't work, it's a safe place for his vote.
  
• Seth's #271 is horrible. It contains extremely poor reasoning, and seems to be basically pushing for the easy mislynch. Very unlikely to come from scumbuddies, very likely to come from Seth scum if zauper's town.
  
• Guybrush flat out defended Zauper. Potential scumbuddy, allthough I'm not sure scum would be that obvious about it.

To summarize: The players of whom I'm most suspicious are almost certainly not zauper's scumbuddies. In fact, a very important reason for being suspicious of them is that their behaviour is exactly what I would expect of scum pushing a town mislynch. And for none of the other players is them being scumbuddies with zauper a likely scenario. There is noone who is likely to be zaupers scumbuddy, IMO, so I have to conclude that he doesn't have a scumbuddy and therefore must be town.

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Regarding my argument against Random Voting and my request for 'real arguments'. This is relevant for your comments on ISO #1, #2, #4, #5, #6, #8 and #15.

I am against random voting of the type "according to random.org, I should vote X" or "vote X because his name consists of a single letter" or some other reason unrelated to the game. I am in favour of trying to get discussion started by voting, provided that the reason given for the vote does provide other players points to discuss. My suspicion of Aurorus and my questioning of Akira were both attempts to start discussion of this type. I made a very specific accusation, that other players could respond to.

When I'm talking about 'real accusations' in this context, I'm talking about anything that is a reasoning for why someone could be scum. "He was first to confirm, must be eager that he got a scum role", "He was last to confirm, wanted more time to talk to his scumbuddy" and "He replaced out because he didn't like getting a scumrole" are all accusations I've made in the past.

Now, let's go over your accusations and the "contradictions" you found.

ISO #1 & #2: You are free to believe that starting discussion in this way is not possible. That debate belongs in mafia discussion. However, you have failed to prove why this behaviour is more likely to come from scum then town in my case. Especially considering the fact that I've used this method in all games I've played from the beginning in the past year.

ISO #4: The statement that accusations are difficult to come by early in the game in no way contradicts that players should try to make those accusations.

ISO #5: The fact that my reasoning is weak extremely early in the game, when little information is available, does not mean that it's ok to use extremely weak reasoning later in the game, when there is more information to go by.

ISO #6: I used my vote of Aurorus as an additional tool to get discussion started. By this time, discussion has started, so a vote was not needed for that reason.

ISO #8: Early on, I stated that I was against random votes with no reason at all. I did not comment in any way on non-random votes based on gut reads.

ISO #15: Same as ISO #8.

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Regarding my statement that I would be ignoring Guybrush' anti chainsaw request from time to time. This is relevant for your comments on ISO #3, #4, #7 and #10.

My opinion here ties back to my opinion on Zauper. I believe it is possible to get town reads in the game of mafia, and believe it is good play to defend those players, even if they can't defend themselves.

Page 38-40 of mini 934 provide a reasonable example of this. In that game, I had a strong townread on SaintKerrigan, to the extend that I was willing to organize a lynch on someone who wasn't my top suspect (but who was scum) simply to avoid my townread being lynched. In particular, I would like to refer to post #971 in that game. Even if SK hadn't been around to answer fate's accusations, I would have made that post, to avoid what I believed to be a mislynch.

The problem with waiting till the accused player has responded is twofold. First of all, there may not be enough time to respond after the accused has posted because of an impeding deadline. Secondly, not responding immediately will mean that the accusation which you don't agree with goes untested longer, and is therefore more likely to incorrectly convince other players who haven't made up their mind yet.

The most important part of my post, IMO, was the line "especially when a question is worded accusingly". I completely agree with Guybrush that only player X should answer the question "X, why did you do that?". However, if someone places an actual accusation ("I believe X is scum because of Y. X, defend please!"), everybody should be free to respond to that accusation.

Looking at the two "contradictions" you cited in this regard:

ISO #4: Guybrush was arguing that answering other players questions was poor play. I am arguin that Valkyrie defending Aurorus is suspicious. Those are two very different things. Valkyrie coming to Aurorus' aid is suspicious not because it breaks Guybrush' rule of thumb, but because there doesn't seem to be a pro-town reasoning behind it.

ISO #7: the problem I had with 2003's explanation of his zauper vote had nothing to do with the fact that zauper hadn't responded yet. I was suspicious of the vote because it blatantly followed someone elses reasoning when it was convenient.

ISO #10: Take a look at the context of my remark to Aurorus. I belief that it is pretty clear that I had not intended to mention my suspicion before my question was answered. I had mentioned my question again when I voted Valkyrie. I only mentioned my suspicion when Guybrush was explicitly speculating on why I would believe Valkyrie to be scum. Does that sound like the accusingly written question that I have no problems with answering for someone else?

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Regarding activity, inactivity, lurking and active lurking. Relevant to your comments on ISO #5, #7, #10 and post #331.

I believe there is a difference between inactivity and (active) lurking. A player is inactive if he doesn't post. Not posting will likely lead to a replacement. A player is (active) lurking if he (intentionally) posts just enough to avoid being replaced, without actually posting content.

Inactivity is never a scumtell. In my experience, all players are equally likely to go inactive, regardless of alignement. A slightly less severe form of inactivity is the player who doesn't post often, but posts good content when he does post. Just like inactivity, this behaviour isn't a scumtell. (Active) lurking OTOH is a scumtell. Scum have more reasons to intentionally avoid posting content then town (which doesn't mean that town never active lurk, unfortunately).

I have no problems with placeholder posts to inform the other players when content will arive. However, such placeholder posts are excellent tools for player who want to active lurk, because it allows them to avoid being prodded without posting any content whatsoever. As such, I'm rather wary of them, especially when they don't announce when content will follow, or if the content that follows is underwhelming.

In your discussion of ISO #5, you mention that I was more angry then shocked at the accusation of lurking. That is correct. Quite a lot of players confuse (forms of) inactivity with lurking. Because of this, I wasn't surprised to be accused of lurking, even though the accusation was incorrect. My response may have been a bit harsh, but I wanted to make it clear that I wasn't going to give my personal schedule.

Regarding ISO #7: The post of Valkyrie did not contain any content, nor did it contain any indication of when content could be expected (other then within a couple of hours, which wasn't kept). The placeholder post did not do anything to inform the other players. The only thing it achieved was that it delayed the moment Valkyrie would be prodded. As such, it was very well possible that it was used solely with the intention of avoiding to post content.

ISO #10: As mentioned before, in order to be considered inactive, a player doesn't post at all. If a player regulary posts that he doesn't have time to post content (and never follows those posts with content), he is a prime example of an active lurker. However, Loaka's play didn't fit that discription.

Regarding #331: at least I follow up on my promises, even though it's way too long.

[MichelSableheart]

Responding to other players posts:

Michel, do you think that the context preceding someone's inactivity should be taken into account? For example, their posts, any questions aimed at them, the number of votes that they have accrued.

Not really, no. A player replacing out because they can't handle pressure probably can't handle pressure both as town and as scum.

Michel, you've stated this without telling us if this changes your read on Omnino. IIRC, the main reason you didn't want to lynch the LM spot was that LM had been incredibly inactive and so you wanted to see more from Omnino and therefore decided that he was an "emergency lynch" only. Since Omnino has been playing, what's your read on his spot?

Very good point. To be honest, I haven't consciously updated my reads since post #222. I'll do a reread, and post my updated opinions on everyone in my next post.

What is your experience with "full majority" lynches nearing the deadline? All of my games that have reached the deadline so far have simply been that "the player with the most votes" got lynched. I'm not sure how concerned I should be that we're within five days of the deadline but it doesn't look like we'll have a full, five-vote majority on anyone at the moment. My immediate thought is that this is a problem, because a no-lynch is not helpful to town at all, but I've never had a "full-majority deadline" conundrum before, so I just wanted your take(s) on it, if anyone has experienced it~

The full majority rule means that town players may need to compromise. Because you can only lynch your top suspect if you convince 4 other players to vote with you, you may have to switch to your second, or even your third top suspect to guarantee a lynch. This also means that discussion needs to shift from "who is suspicious" to "who should we lynch" well before deadline. If that doesn't happen, you'll usually see a last minute flurry of vote changes that is unlikely to catch scum.

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@2003: The deadline is there to make sure that we actually try to decide on a lynch. Requesting a deadline extension because we can't decide on a lynch is unlikely to work. It's going directly against the purpose of a deadline.

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Replacements defending the player they replaced definately is NOT a waste of time. There is a major different between a replacement reading his predecessor and someone in a different slot reading that player.

Someone in a different playerslot is trying to figure out the alignement. If they see something that scum is likely to do, they become suspicious of it. On the other hand, a replacement knows the alignement of his predecessor, and therefore "knows" that the actions of his predecessor aren't scum motivated. Because of this, they are far more likely to find the town interpretation of the replacement's actions.

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@Seth: continually mentioning that you're town isn't going to do anything to convince anyone, all it does is annoy us. We don't know your alignement, and we know that if you were mafia, you would say the same thing.

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I see nothing wrong with thePerson's claim, actually. You are allowed to claim whenever you believe it is best for the town. You don't have to wait till you're at L-1. Given the amount of pressure he was under, both from players voting him and players announcing they are suspicious of him, he definately should have claimed when he did.

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(1) I don't like you discouraging other people of doing detailed analysis on you. Such a statement from an SE seems like bullying.

I have no problems with players doing a detailed analysis, but there really is no need to post that detailed analysis completely. "I believe MichelSableheart is contradicting himself. In his first two posts, he asks players to use valid reasoning, then later on he votes on gut" would have worked just as well as the point by point analysis he was doing now.

(2) It's unusual that lots of your premises contain "potentially distancing\possible distancing\far more likely\potential scumbuddy", yet your conclusion contains "must be town". Your level of confidence came as a surprise even to me.

The players who I mention as potential scumbuddies are Aurorus, Akira and you. These are exactly the players I have little to no suspicion of.

[MichelSableheart]

Time for my opinions on everyone. I'll try to keep it short.

omnino/LoakaMossi - Loaka is the archetypical inactive. Didn't really know what he was doing, didn't get involved, posted once when being prodded, got replaced afterwards. No read on him. Omnino's behaviour towards Zauper is remarkable. In ISO #6, he is wary of voting Zauper when Zauper will likely be replaced soon. In ISO #7, without posts from Zauper inbetween, and without the mod having commented on Zauper, he decides to place the L-1 vote. As a pressure vote, it was completely worthless, because all evidence at the time said that Zauper had simply disappeared (pressuring the mod for a replacement would have been more worthwile). As a trap vote, it's pretty useless as well. We don't need a flip to do investigations. Being willing to lynch someone solely to get discussion going on day 2 is a waste of a lynch. On the other hand, as scum play hoping to get an easy mislynch while being able to put the blame on someone else, it fits pretty well. Because of his behaviour towards the zauper slot, my suspicion on him has risen, though he isn't my top suspect. His suspicion on me seems to be mainly him missing the point of my early posts, which is mightily annoying but could come from both scum and town.

Akira - Akira doesn't really stand out. Especially early in the game, I find it difficult to discover what his opinions are. His behaviour towards zauper feels a bit of. He doesn't comment on zauper at all, till he suddenly names him as second top suspect. Shortly afterwards, he vote for zauper (the top lynch) when he leaves for V/LA, even though his reasoning feels extremely weak. After his V/LA, he still seems to be very hesitant with sharing his opinions. My read on him hasn't really changed. Something feels of, could be scum, but no strong scumread.

thePerson/zauper - As stated before, I believe this slot is likely town. When I read zaupers post, I see him bring up original opinions and content. I don't see any of this "overtly agreeing" he is accused of. Furthermore, most of the players voting for him or announcing suspicion on him are doing so in a highly suspicious manner. ThePerson only recently joined, so I haven't much read on him either way. I would like to see him give opinions on who is suspicious and why though. I personally won't be voting this slot today, and likely won't be voting this slot tomorrow either.

seth/Valkyrie_Hrist - Highly suspicious slot. Valkyrie's claim in the beginning of the game that she wanted to go to actual discussion immediately directly contradicts the fact that she didn't make any attempt to get such discussion started at the time. Her concern about my vote for Aurorus is remarkable, as town don't really have a reason to react like that. Seth replacing in didn't improve my opinion of the slot. His attack on zauper in ISO #1 seems to be just a bunch of opportunistic rubbish. His reactions when answering questions strike me as unhelpful. And if zauper was suspicious for agreeing with others to much, what about his reaction to Omnino's case against me? This is definately my top suspect, and the player I would like to see lynched today.

ooBAZZoo - BAZZ' attack against zauper is one of the few that feels genuine. Overall, he has been pressuring a lot of players, giving good reasoning. He has explained his reason for his vote well. I see no reason to be suspicious of him.

2003041 - 2003's play early in the game has a rather OMGUSy feel, as if he's trying to chase away people voting for him by attacking them. When BAZZ raised a case against zauper, 2003 was far too eager to change the reason of his vote to agreeing with BAZZ. His suggestion to simply vote Valkyrie out of the game was extremely suspicious as well, allthough it makes it unlikely that the two of them are scumbuddies. Still have him as my second top suspect.

Guybrush - Good reasoning, good questioning, no signs of opportunism. I see no reasons to be suspicious of him at this time.

AurorusVox - It's difficult to determine Aurorus opinions, not because he hasn't given them, but because they get hidden in the huge amount of questioning he does. I haven't found much that would be interpreted as scum trying to manipulate the game, though. No reasons to be suspicious of him still.

[MichelSableheart]

p.s. Aurorus - could you please keep that votes table of yours up-to-date, as it makes it alot easier to follow votes than scrolling through the thread. Thanks.

I must have missed something. What votes table, and when did Aurorus link to it? I can't find it when searching Aurorus ISO. A postnumber or ISO number would really help.

@ Michel, Aurorus and Guybrush: Is [continually saying you're town] scummy or not? I personally believe it is, but I really need to hear what experienced players think of it.

It's more a sign of poor, inexperienced play then anything, IMO. If you had to pin an alignement to it, a pro-town player would realize that such a comment coming from a different player is unhelpful for him, and is therefore less likely to do it. A mafia player might believe that repeating it often enough could actually make the other players belief it. As such, mafia is probably slightly more likely to do it then town. But I don't think it's a strong enough tell to base an entire case around.

[MichelSableheart]

-Is it just you that gets to post Wall-o-texts? I had a lot of valid points to bring up about your game, and I did so in a structured analysis of your ISO. It split my points up in to posts you had made so that nothing was confusing or hard to find. I fail to see what your problem is.

The problem is that your post was at least twice the lenght of my longest post at the time (for the lenght of which I apologized), despite my various requests in thread to keep things concise in order to keep things readable.

And yes, scum is more likely to post inconsistencies because scum is making it up as they go along - therefore they may struggle to stick to the same lies/falsehoods twice. If your game-play is inconsistent, and the opinions you herald are contradicting, it seems to me that you are not seeing the game from the same side all the time, which would be symptomatic of scum trying to see things as a townie but struggling to keep his mind in the game.

Town's opinion changes all the time, as new information becomes available. OTOH, scum already have complete information at the start of the game, and are far less likely to change their mind as a result. Besides, scum tend to be careful with what they say, because they don't want to draw attention to themselves, whereas town can speak far more freely because they know their actions are town motivated and can be explained. I can't agree with your claim that inconsistencies are a scumtell at all.

Regarding the strenght of my read: At the beginning of a newbie game, when I don't know anything about anyone at all, I know there are two scum in the eight other players, giving each player a 75% chance of being town. This chance increases or decreases as more information becomes available. "We might have lost a townie." to me means that it is possible but unlikely that the person in question is town, which doesn't fit anyone at this stage in the game really (I still estimate the chance of Seth being town to be at least 60%). I would use the other two possibilities for someone who I believe is slightly more likely then random to be town. However, in the case of zauper, I have a strong townread on him. I estimate the chance of him being town at 90-95%. That's getting to the point where the chance of him being scum is getting neglectable, especially because complete certainty is implied not to exist except in special cases.

-Like your grasp of English being too poor to spot subtleties, but you being able to give a better understanding of Zaupers nods-in-agreement than anyone else? Or you refusing to let people answer for themselves, and saying there's no need to stick to it, then getting quite annoyed and verbal about it when someone does the same to one of your suspects/questions? Like you desperate for REAL ACCUSATIONS to start with then admitting they don't really exist as early as you wanted them and whilst voting on very flimsy reasoning for AV? Voting for Valk on gut reads, not fitting with your 'Questions, Accusations, Cases!' ethos... these are real and vivid contradictions, whether you want to admit it or not. The point of your posts is irrelevant to the case in point; which is that what you appear to be holding important at one stage of the game and campaigning for, does not fit what you are doing the same for only a few posts later. I couldn't give a monkeys if you say they don't count as contradictions because you posted them a few days apart at different stages of the game, your opinions and thoughts seem to directly contradict because they are flailing wildly around the spectrum - thus; contradiction.

1. I have never claimed to understand zauper's agreements post better then anyone else. I merely claimed that
   I
   did not believe he was agreeing more often than* normal.
2. I mentioned that it was
   sometimes
   ok to answer for other players, and mentioned the particular cases I had in mind. I never claimed it was
   always
   ok to answer for other players, regardless of circumstances.
3. If someone placed an early vote
   , I wanted to see an argumentation that might make sense. I never said anything about the type of argumentation needed for later votes.

The point of my posts is essential, because I was making statements applying only to particular situations, not broad statements applying to the game in general.

-But you do admit that you fail to grasp the subtleties of the English language, and therefor could be missing things or misinterpreting them.

That is a possibility, yes.

-So you agree that he did a fair amount of passive-agreeing?

Where are you getting that from?


*You have made your point about then being wrong in comparisons. I'll likely forget about it, but there's no need to keep mentioning it.

[MichelSableheart]

Ninja-edit: Michel, in your last post, you've defended inconsistency. Can you explain what situations you have in mind when inconsistencies are okay? There's a difference between people changing their minds about things, and people not sticking to what they said they would do; if someone said "Lynch all liars" but then didn't lynch a liar, or if they voted for someone for doing something that they themselves have done, would you not find that suspicious?

As with all things in mafia, the main point to look at is motivation. In both cases you mentioned, the player should be questioned.

Why did they believe that all liars should be lynched? Why didn't they want to lynch this particular liar? If they give an explanation that is believable to come from a pro-town player, the inconsistency isn't scummy. On the other hand, if from the questioning I believe they said "lynch all liars" not because they believed it but in order to appease the town, or if I believe that they don't want to lynch this particular liar because he's their scumbuddy, that definately is a reason to be suspicious of them.

Same goes for voting someone for something you yourself have done. What is your pro-town explanation for originally doing it? And why doesn't that explanation apply for the player you're voting?

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@Omnino 376: Appearantly, I wasn't clear. In your comments on ISO #8, you 'asked' why I couldn't respond to Aurorus' accusation against zauper when I claimed I read his ISO in my ISO #7. My response was that the read of his ISO in ISO #7 was particulary to check the accusations of zauper more then usual. My conclusions on reading that ISO can be found in post #156. I believe that the conclusion of "I'm not at all convinced by the argument that Zauper is agreeing with others more then would be natural." is completely different from "So you agree that he did a fair amount of passive-agreeing?".

[MichelSableheart]

Congratulations! The three (;p) of you played a good game.

I've read along after being killed, but not close enough to give personal comments on day 2. I was dissappointed to see the Wall of Texts return, and feel that they may have played an important role in the reduced activity day 2 (it's a lot more difficult to get back in the game if you have several long posts to read every time you visit the thread). I was also a bit surprised to see how long everyone waited with voting day 2. A vote can do a lot to clarify suspicions and does add pressure. Now, the day 2 lynch of Earth Intruder felt like it came out of the blue a bit.